But the flood is likely to be smaller than some bullish observers expect.

It’s not an impressive sight. Senior executives of leading financial firms have been castigating the media and investors for over-reacting to the US sub-prime mortgage crisis, insisting that their own firms remain sound and yet simultaneously pleading with the central banks to come and bail them out. It’s either a crisis or it’s not, guys. So which way do you want it?

The problems in the SIV sector are not only the result of funding and mark-to-market distress, but also because of sloppy structuring in the first place.

Population-growth and climate trends point to the growing importance of agricultural commodity markets.

The IMF has mandated Publishing Technology, an AIM-listed provider of publishing-specific software solutions, to create an e-library, bringing all of the IMF’s resources online.

Funds of hedge funds with underlying managers that have gone sour are understating the losses they have incurred.

In August the markets rocked and, in turn, Argentina was dumped. Chloe Hayward goes to Buenos Aires to find out why.

Companies from central and eastern European countries already in the European Union have adopted an increasingly aggressive strategy of making acquisitions in their faster-growing non-EU neighbours. The aim, it seems, is to gain a foothold before traditionally stronger western European and north American firms scoop up all the best deals. Dominic O’Neill reports.

While one country goes from strength to strength, the rest of Latin America is seeing very slow growth in funds. Helen Avery looks at the opportunities available to managers in the region.

Jones Lang LaSalle, this year's winner of the Euromoney/Liquid real estate poll, is expanding with the global real estate markets. CEO Colin Dyer explains why a local feeling is important in a global market, and why sustainability makes business sense.

Serbia’s equity market has spent most of the year firmly in positive territory. But can the good times last? Guy Norton reports from Belgrade.

Peru’s economic miracle has taken it to the threshold of investment-grade status and enthused the country’s local and foreign bankers, who are rapidly broadening their corporate and retail markets. Leticia Lozano reports.

With various trading platforms reporting record volumes, it would be easy to think that foreign exchange had emerged from the wider market turmoil in the rudest of health. But some market participants fear that serious fault lines have been discovered in derivatives.

Lehman Brothers is the latest bank to tap into the growing demand for FX indices (see the weeklyFiX, August 24: "Now is the time for investable FX indices"). Its FX indices (LBFX) track the performance of a long position in G10 currencies against the US dollar. Total returns are calculated daily and incorporate spot and carry return components.

Jerome Cohen has joined Standard Chartered after a 13-year stretch at ABN Amro. In his new role, Cohen will look after Standard Chartered’s complex FX risk team based in Singapore. He will report directly to Richard Leighton, the bank’s global head of FX.

Korea’s new found openness to foreigners, as it strives to become a regional financial centre, is about to face its first test.

Baring Asset Management says the fallout from the sub-prime worries in the US is creating buying opportunities in emerging Europe, which investors would do well to take advantage of.

Fixed-income funds hit hard by CDOs/sub-prime troubles.

In any economic downturn, banks are nearly always the first businesses to suffer, which is why the recent spike in credit growth among Korea’s banks looks alarming.

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Cash-strapped Belarus has finally made it onto the international ratings map – both Moody’s Investors Service and Standard & Poor’s have assigned it ratings ahead of a planned debut sovereign Eurobond, which should be launched in the fourth quarter. Moody’s rated the country at its Ba2 level for foreign currency borrowings, and S&P graded it B+.

The Turkish banking regulation and supervision agency (BDDK) has prevented Greece’s Alpha Bank from completing its acquisition of a 50% stake in Alternatifbank.

Mortgage securitization by Brazilian banks has huge potential as the mortgage market is still worth only 2.2% of GDP.

Merger talks between E*Trade and TD Ameritrade could be a sign of things to come.

According to a study by research and consulting firm Greenwich Associates, hedge funds generated nearly 30% of US fixed-income trading volume last year.

Independent research firms feel the squeeze as fund managers consume more but spend less.

Two approaches to replication leave a gap in the market.

Internal Revenue Service regulations that become effective in January next year are forcing US hedge fund managers to re-evaluate how they defer fees.

In 2006, the top 20 hedge fund and private equity fund managers earned more in 10 minutes than an average worker in the US made in the entire year, according to a report by advocacy groups Institute for Policy Studies and United for a Fair Economy.

A research note from macroeconomic research consultant Capital Economics says that current market turmoil will lead to hedge fund losses but performance won’t be as bad as feared, and investors are unlikely to turn away from the asset class.