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Saxo Bank has opened for business in Prague, driven, the bank says, by a doubling of its business in the central and eastern Europe region. The office will be headed by Karol Piovarcsy. “Sustainable success is driven by customer focus and the new office, the first in the central and eastern European region, will enable us to have greater access to clients and partners in the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Poland,” he says. “While clients will continue to benefit from Saxo Bank’s aggregated tier 1 liquidity and technology, the new office will enable us to enhance education both through our own products and through increased partnerships with institutional partners.”

FX salesmen Chris Eagle and Günter Grimm have apparently left UniCredit in London. Word is that Eagle has soared off to a fund, while Grimm has decided he will be happier at RBS doing German sales.

The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) has appointed Diego Devos as its general counsel. Devos will take up his brief on October 1 once Daniel Lefort, who has been the bank’s general counsel since January 2006, retires. Devos, who has been at BIS since 2006 as deputy general counsel, will also serve as a member of the bank’s executive committee.

William Dudley has been appointed chairman of the Committee on Payment and Settlement Systems. Dudley, who has been president and chief executive of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York since January 27 2009, succeeds Timothy Geithner in the role.

Online FX trading specialist Gain Capital has hired market veteran Jane Foley as research director for its FOREX.com offering. Foley, who will be based at the company’s newly opened London office, will work closely with Brian Dolan, FOREX.com’s chief currency strategist. The company says its aim is to deliver research to its clients on a 24-hour basis.

How could the European football authorities be so stupid? Didn’t they know this is the same night as the FX Poll Dinner?

The global scare over swine flu continues and is getting closer to home. On Monday, I received two telephone calls in rapid succession from close members of my family. “I’ve just seen the news,” said my mother. “And they’ve shut your school because of an outbreak of swine flu,” she told me with a hint of worry in her voice.

While there were a few signs of the impact of the credit crunch – a couple of the normal players were absent and the standard of freebies was marginally lower than 2008 – it was pretty much business as usual at the Euromoney Forex Forum.

I went for a quick beer last week with Glenn Stevens, the chief executive of retail specialist Gain Capital. I haven’t seen Glenn since 1990, when he was at Bankers NY trading spot JPY. He was in town to open Gain’s London office and chatting away, he soon made it clear that the intention is to capture what he still very much believes is an expanding market.

Retail FX sales still booming...

I finally got to bury one of the FX market’s more enduring urban myths at this year's FX Forum.

Deutsche Bank retains top position for fifth consecutive year; Highest-ever turnover and client activity recorded in Euromoney’s industry benchmark survey.