Unprecedented high spreads between European government bonds are prompting some radical – and frankly unworkable – new ideas.

Predicting corporate default rates on the basis of historical experience is a futile pastime.

The central bank has begun to address the financial crisis but must take more action.

Can Gulf financial centres’ high ambitions be fulfilled in a post-credit crunch world with falling oil prices?

The government bail out packages unveiled across developed countries last month may have prevented the collapse of a host of banks with more toxic assets than equity.

What was previously a winning model has become instantly bereft of merit in the eyes of investors.

Government intervention shows that there is real cause for concern.

The witch-hunt of Dick Fuld is wrong. But that doesn’t mean it won’t continue.

Have the big Japanese banks been over-cautious about buying stakes in troubled western peers?

Indian bank suffers from loss of confidence as crisis spreads beyond the US and Europe.

African borrowers and international lenders need to be judicious in their approach to funding on the back of new energy discoveries.

The rapid and decisive intervention of European national authorities to prop up vulnerable banks might well limit the extent of European banks’ funding problems.

Analysts at JPMorgan suggest that prime money market funds, which had $2 trillion of assets under management in early September and are a leading provider of short-term liquidity to the banking system, suffered between $350 billion and $400 billion of redemptions after the Prime Reserve fund broke the buck following losses on its $385 million holdings of Lehman commercial paper.

The outcry against and restrictions on short-selling of financials stocks were unjustified and ill-advised and will have a deleterious impact.

Rightly or wrongly, credit derivatives will pay the price for failings across the entire credit market.

Proposals to make a settlement with hold-outs to Argentina’s defaulted bonds could raise the country much-needed funds.

Investors who bought into the bank hybrid argument are unlikely to do so again in a hurry.

The US bank (and it will take a while to get used to calling it such) stays one step ahead of the pack through successful capital raisings.

UniCredit is one of the world’s biggest financial groups but concerns over its capital base have made it vulnerable to panic-stricken investors.

Government intervention in financial markets goes against the grain of any US administration. However, it appears preventing closure of the mortgage finance markets is more important than ideology.

The blow-up of corporate trades in China might lead to regulatory restraints on transparent, run-of-the-mill derivatives use.

US leaders might ponder the lessons of Venezuela and Iran.

Despite a new round of fundraising for distressed ABS, a market floor is not necessarily in sight.

But exchange still looks like a political tool.

Commodity prices will need to go higher again to prompt consumer and producer actions that bring them down.

The present round of bank reorganizations look as if they might not be as efficacious as leaving things well alone.

Many banks will become less-levered, more conservative, far duller institutions promising much lower and more utility-like returns to investors

Concerns about an economic slowdown now weigh on capital markets.

Under his presidency, Pakistan made huge progress in attracting foreign investment, privatization and bolstering the banking system.

Family disputes in Asian listed companies have an unfortunate propensity to boil over unresolved into the public arena, raising important corporate governance issues.