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.

Billionaire Thaksin Shinawatra kept his job as Thailand's prime minister, but only by the skin of his teeth and as a result of a split court judgement last month. An immediate political and constitutional crisis was thereby avoided - but only at the risk of buffeting the country's fragile political system and storing up trouble for later.

Legislation is pending that should liberalize Saudi Arabia’s capital markets and attract foreign investment and returning Saudi capital. The extent of these reforms will show how far the country’s leaders intend to open up an economy that needs capital investment and job creation.

Erste Bank sets its sights on large local corporates, a less coveted market for regional expansion, but one that could prove to have greater potential.

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

Euromoney's September edition had already gone to press when news broke of the horriffc terrorist attack on the World Trade Centre in New York and the Pentagon in Washington, DC. The sheer scale of the destruction and loss of life numbs the mind, making rational analysis almost impossible. Financial markets consist of nothing more than men and women buying and selling. In the immediate aftermath few could turn their minds to anything so mundane as dealing or stock tipping. It's likely that every reader of Euromoney will have known people who worked in the World Trade Centre and it is with those unfortunate individuals that most people's thoughts now lie.

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.

If ever a finance minister was in the firing line, Shaukat Aziz is that man. The 30-year veteran of Citibank is saddled with the task of selling yet another military government in Pakistan to a sceptical international investor community.

Being an investment banker in the Philippines is rarely dull. One day you might find yourself being blamed for triggering a collapse in the currency, the next winning a mandate for an unplaceable bond deal. Nerves and tempers are being frayed in the country’s financial markets by fears about collapsing exports, a weakening currency, fiscal deficits and exclusion from international capital markets. Everyone hopes that the new president can clean up the mess.

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.

A small group of western-minded business leaders have banded together to lobby for a Russia free from robber barons and fit for their children by the year 2015.

The departure of David Salisbury from Schroders gives more ammunition to those critics who say the firm lacks direction.

Mexico has prospered through ever-closer links to the US, which has been the main market for its booming exports. Seven years on from its own crisis, Mexico now appears strong enough to shrug off any contagion from Argentina. The downside, though, is that Mexico will now suffer if the US economy goes into a deep and prolonged downturn. Faults in its economy may yet be revealed.

John Reed kept himself to himself in the latter part of his career at Citibank. And these days he is pretty reclusive. Colleagues say he is still haunted by the period in 1999 when, in the aftermath of Citi’s takeover by Travelers, he was eclipsed by his co-chairman, Sandy Weill.

Some Citibank alumni did not simply live on their legacy at Citi, but made their own legacies.

What do the the CEO of Standard Chartered, the finance minister of Pakistan, the central bank governor of the Philippines and the opposition leader in Liberia have in common? They all used to work at Citibank.

After two years in the job, the South African Reserve Bank’s governor Tito Mboweni has earned the respect and admiration of his peers and market players. His biggest success has been in bringing inflation under control.

Washington's battles with big budget deficits may seem like a distant memory, but a familiar refrain from those days has taken on new meaning for the IMF. "Less is more" has been a powerful, if unstated, theme running through many Fund-led packages, ever since the Mexican peso crisis of 1994-95.

The Wallenberg family presides over some of Sweden’s most famed industrial names such as Ericsson and Saab. Its grip over the Investor AB trust seems unassailable. But is it? Martin Ebner of BZ Bank is probing their defences and questioning the dynamism of the top management. These protagonists have crossed swords before.

Former Citibanker Deogracias Vistan has taken over as CEO of Equitable PCI, and his main goal is to clean up the bank's balance sheet and its image. The bank’s relationship with Joseph Erap Estrada does not make Vistan’s task an easy one.