In emerging markets fixed income, three investors have raised themselves to superstar status. Mohamed El-Erian, Simon Treacher and Jerome Booth have all earned enviable reputations. Raphael Kassin’s move from ABN Amro to Credit Suisse could place him in the same firmament. Julian Marshall reports.

No one doubts that China’s banks will make acquisitions abroad. What is less clear is when the buying spree will start and what international expansion strategies the banks will deploy. The answers might not be obvious. Chris Leahy 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.

Russia’s flourishing mortgage market is the next big opportunity for the country’s securitization market. Jethro Wookey reports from Moscow.

Kuwait Finance House is eyeing up certain branches of Malaysia’s RHB Bank, according to Salman Younis, the chief of the Gulf bank’s Malaysian unit. RHB Bank has obtained regulatory approval to start the sale talks but the Malaysian unit of KFH was still awaiting the nod from Malaysia’s central bank to begin discussions. At the moment there are up to 30 branches that could change hands in the next few months.

Man is the world’s largest hedge fund group, with more than $65 billion in assets. It also claims to be the greenest hedge fund. CEO Peter Clarke tells Helen Avery how alternative investment firms can offer the returns investors want and play a positive role in preventing climate change.

The Brazilian has brought a sense of euphoria back to the country and established it one of the four key emerging nations, as part of the Bric group.

The disappearance of both CP investors and ABS buyers in August had grave consequences for those vehicles that rely on both.

Serbia’s minister of the economy and former finance minister is uncompromising – and his approach has been crucial to the revival of his country’s economic fortunes.

When the investment trust structure appeared four years ago, the securitization market jerked into action and local banks jumped on a growing opportunity. Now foreign banks are taking a fresh look at the market, eyeing the rich pickings that are emerging from securitizing receivables for corporates, banks and states. Chloe Hayward reports from São Paulo.

UNTIL RECENTLY, INDIA occupied a hazy part of the average global investment banking CEO’s brain marked "untapped potential". That fuzziness has been wiped clean this year. Investment banks are piling into India, snapping up experienced local and expatriate talent, completing multi-billion dollar cross-border mergers, and establishing cost-efficient data centres employing thousands of skilled engineers.

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

It’s hard to empathize with the faceless investment bank and institutional investor victims of the sub-prime crash. What’s really needed is an individual whose story people can relate to.

Sinan Al-Shabibi, governor of the Central Bank of Iraq, speaks to Sudip Roy about the bank’s efforts to control inflation, curb exchange rate instability and cope with the difficult security situation.

From Cuba to Zimbabwe, and from Iraq to Sudan, London-based securities firm Exotix has taken the esoteric markets label and made it its own. Following its recent split from parent company Icap, Exotix is turning away from its background in distressed debt and trading more and more assets from frontier markets. Dominic O’Neill reports.

Tamweel controls one-third of Dubai’s burgeoning mortgage market. In the wake of the company’s issuance of the Gulf’s first ever internationally rated securitization, Dominic O’Neill talks to the company’s CFO and CEO.

BGC, an inter-dealer brokerage firm, has bought Marex Financial’s emerging markets equity derivatives business for an undisclosed sum.

Taiwan’s grandiose plan to create a big national financial holding company by the end of 2007 has left analysts on the island cold.

Liquidity in the global debt and bank markets is scarce but judging by the action of Brazil’s leading private equity firm, the financial crisis has yet to hit Latin America’s biggest economy. São Paulo-based GP Investments has entered into one of the biggest leveraged buyouts in Brazil, in what is expected to be the first of many similar transactions. In August, the private equity firm agreed to acquire 100% of Pride International’s Latin American Land Drilling and E&P Services businesses for $1 billion in cash. The transaction is expected to close by the end of the third quarter.