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Brady Dougan and Paul Calello stripped down Credit Suisse’s investment banking vehicle as the credit crisis hit. Now they’re showing off a streamlined, non-polluting, yet powerful firm that even their competitors admire. Is Credit Suisse the model of a new investment bank? Clive Horwood reports.

ROTHSCHILD: Having helped governments prop up teetering banks, Rothschild is now advising on the overhaul of entire financial systems

A wave of regulation following the initial impact of the global financial crisis has targeted the alternative investment sector, and hedge funds in particular. The industry is mobilising to influence and deflect some of the measures. Caroline Allen reports

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CIBC has hired Chris Dunning as its global head of FX options and Eric Ohayon as a managing director, FX and commodity structuring. Dunning, who joins from UniCredit, will be located in Toronto and reports to Tim Carrington, the bank’s global head of FX options. Ohayon, who was at Bank of America, will also be based in Toronto and reports to Bill Bamber, CIBC’s global head, structuring.

It’s the time of year when many participants from the FX market put on their Lycra and get their legs over. There are two classic amateur bike rides coming up: the fearsome Marmotte is held this weekend and the L’Etape du Tour the week after.

They say that you get what you pay for, but that’s not strictly true in FX. As we all know, the buy side is extremely well serviced and has to pay for very little. It can trade on multiple venues without paying a commission. Of course it could be argued that the explicit cost of trading is insignificant compared to the implicit one, but many banks now allow their clients to put in their own bids and offers on their proprietary platforms.

We all know FX is wonderful, so as well as being the most professional financial market in existence, the industry should be proud of the role it has played in creating many of things we take for granted in the modern world. Without FX, there would have been no internet, no txt msging, no chat rooms, Facebook or Twitter. Though some of that list may not be something to be proud of.

The talk about the need for an alternative to the USD continues – or it doesn’t, depending on which Chinese official you speak to on the day. But as Commerz points out this week, the IMF’s decision to issue up to $500 billion of SDR bonds was a surprise. The expectation had been for issuance of $150 billion. The bank adds that so far, only China, Russia and Brazil have shown any interest in funding the IMF this way and that the SDR – a basket made up of USD, EUR, JPY and GBP – “will hardly vie with the dollar for dominance as the world’s major reserve currency. Especially since the recent statistics on central bank reserves show that in the first quarter the dollar’s share of reserves grew further (from 64.1% to 65%). So, in the crisis, the dollar is the safe haven for central banks, too.”

The FX market bounced back nicely in June. This month sees the welcome addition of numbers from Thomson Reuters, which says it will now publish its monthly figures on the new www.hihifrds.com portal. The company saw a combined monthly spot volume of around $132 billion on its Thomson Reuters Dealing, Matching and Reuters Trading for FX services. This was a 17% increase on its turnover in May.

After working there man and boy, Mike Peacock is rumoured to have left Barclays, where he was head of real money FX sales. Sources say that he has been well looked after and that he has already been replaced by an external candidate, rumoured to be Tim Maloney, who was at Citi.