Turkish inspectors have discovered that the governmental abuse of the state banks continues and has remained unpunished.

Hong Kong is facing a crisis - how to fund an increasing budget deficit at a time of almost unprecedented economic downturn.

A law that was passed virtually unnoticed will come into effect this month and has prompted many strategic and financial investors to question whether any investment in Korea’s financial sector is wise.

Société Générale paid Eu1.2 billion for 60% of Komercni Banka as it moved into the Czech Republic in June. The move was criticized as too risky. Now, it appears that it was right on target.

Russia’s vast utilities are gravely afflicted. In desperate need of investment to rebuild worn-out plant and distribution networks, they are also drained of income because of uneconomic pricing and persistent corruption. Ben Aris reports on the progress of restructuring

Russian bonds are looking much safer than equities, offering good growth potential while still guaranteeing favourable yields. Once again, investors have their eyes on bonds.

Dubai prepares for the IMF/World Bank meetings in 2003 by building five-star hotels, new roads and upgrading the transport system.

It is over a year since president Vladimir Putin moved to bring unruly Russian regional governors to heel, but it is still unclear whether the system of federal districts he introduced will help or hinder foreign investors intrepid enough to venture into Russia.

Equity buyers are increasingly basing investment decisions on companies’ records on corporate governance as well as on projected real shareholder returns. The challenge for investors is to measure and reward good corporate governance practice as readily as they have criticized bad corporate governance in the past. Euromoney offers its own contribution, with a new corporate governance ranking and also reproduces analyses by banks. For investors and companies, especially in emerging markets, new rules of engagement are being drawn up. Kapila Monet reports, research by Andrew Newby

World Bank president James Wolfensohn responds to the many criticisms being thrown at the institution, points to some of its recent achievements and outlines a vision of how it might work in future.

The tango effect is being felt in the international bond and currency markets and in the halls of the central bank in Brasilia, but so far it has had relatively little effect on the average Brazilian.

Saudi Arabia’s banks are bracing for a period of intense retail competition by preparing to launch new products, especially for Islamic and internet banking, and developing personal and mortgage lending.

Argentina is looking at the worst case of deflation that the world has seen since the US great depression in the 1930s, and it is hard to see where the necessary boosts in confidence and growth are going to come from to break this confidence crisis.

Lars Thunell, president of SEB, in which Investor has a large stake, explains its strategy

Ben Aris spoke to Arkard Volsky, chairman of the Russian Union for Industrialists & Entrepreneurs about the influential pressure group of top businessmen.

Under James Wolfensohn the World Bank has beaten off influential enemies through polished public relations, but there are still widespread doubts about the effectiveness of Bank policies. Projects continue to fail and adjustment lending has in many cases been granted without proper safeguards. Bank insiders claim that programmes are increasingly effective but critics point to the weakness of Bank models for measuring success.

In an economic downturn, law firms specializing in financial business can ease the pain by establishing relations with their clients that are not strictly based on individual deals. The clients may also benefit.

The Korean government wants to sell Seoul Bank to a blue-chip foreign strategic investor. But the likes of HSBC aren’t interested. So how far should the government compromise and maybe encourage a private-equity fund? The problem is that in the run-up to an election, the government is hemmed in by the favourable deal it struck with Newbridge, which was widely ridiculed by the local media.

The reform of Russia’s electricity sector is going faster than that of other utilities. UES chief executive Anatoly Chubais talked to Ben Aris about the proposals and the timetable

Strong-arm tactics haven’t entirely disappeared from Russia’s industrial consolidation process but the most successful companies are increasingly ploughing ahead by using gentler methods.

When international rating agencies announced a negative outlook on India's sovereign rating in early August, the equity and bond markets barely reacted.

The number and variety of regional and municipal issuers tapping the international markets continues to grow steadily. Central governments across the Americas, Americasand emerging markets want to devolve financial responsibility. The degree of sovereign support varies.

On August 13, the two-year versus 30-year US treasury yield curve gapped out to a seven-year high of 184 basis points. The two-year treasury was trading at its lowest ever yield in the 25 years since the two-year security was first introduced, and three-month Libor was even lower at 3.57%. Moreover, with the US economy showing no signs of recovery, short-end rates seem set to move even tighter. The extraordinary steepness of the US yield curve has provided mouthwatering swap opportunities for corporates that would not normally consider conversion of fixed-rate liabilities to floating rate. The greater than normal swap business has also put added downward pressure on swap spreads.

Most of the prize assets have been snapped up as bank privatization draws to an end in Europe’s emerging markets. Those banks that remain on offer are getting more pricey. But impending European Union accession for several countries means this is still an appealing market and is driving strategic change among both veteran players and big-spending newcomers.

General Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan's head of state, talks about his country's economic programme, the Afghan Taliban and Islamic fundamentalism.

David Malpass, chief international economist at Bear Stearns, in a speech last month to the National Economists Club in Washington outlines the view that the world economy is entering a long, "saucer-shaped" slowdown. The nub of the problem is deflation, reckons Malpass. The flip side of the greenback's repeated 10% year-on-year gains is a drop in commodity prices of roughly the same amount. That's going to result in hard knocks for many economies.

The IMF has begun to stress prevention of crises rather than their cure and the new US administration agrees. But that raises numerous imponderables. Should the stress of prevention be on incentives to countries to behave responsibly or on building sound international financial architecture? And if the goal is to seek out better ways of forecasting impending crisis, does the IMF have the legitimacy to release market-moving information of this sort?

Many bankers Euromoney has spoken to are fearful that anti-capitalist and anti-globalization protesters will severely disrupt this year's IMF/World Bank meetings - and some even refuse to discuss the issue on the record because they don't want to give the protesters the oxygen of publicity.

The February currency crisis has left Turkish banks bereft of capital. Disciplines imposed after the December 1999 IMF stand-by agreement mean that they are unable to replenish their reserves in the time-honoured way – by lending to the government. Underlying the sector’s particular problems – the only answer to which seems to lie in consolidation and foreign investment – is a generalized economic quagmire in which flounders a discredited political elite. There is little optimism to be found among those in the know in Turkey and the most pessimistic predict that a third crisis is just around the corner.

The UAE’s capital markets have been neglected by the federation’s own high-net-worth individuals while foreign investors have been excluded from many sectors. However, the rich are likely to invest more at home in the wake of market volatility elsewhere and foreigners may also be attracted by such deals as Emirates Airlines’ bond. But much remains to be done to develop local markets.