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The UK Treasury is understood to be considering the establishment of a conduit-style fund that would source investment directly from institutional investors such as pension funds and insurance companies to fund its infrastructure investment programme. The UK government would own the conduit and take the first-loss risk in the vehicle. Management of the conduit would be outsourced to a third party – insiders suggest that one of the monoline guarantors is being considered. The conduit could be launched in the next three to six months.

In the second part of Euromoney’s foreign exchange debate, which took place in late 2008, industry experts consider the future for the business. There is still cause for optimism, although inflation remains a big unknown and there are real fears of governments’ ability to sustain debt levels.

This year is not set to be one of economic recovery – the financial assets that are cheap are cheap for a very good reason, and it’s not a propitious one.

Chile is on track to weather the financial crisis and avoid a recession. “Chile managed the boom years incredibly well and now they have the funds to help smooth the financial cycles and work through this crisis. We have a pretty favourable outlook on Chile for 2009,” says Casey Reckman, associate director in Fitch’s Latin American sovereign group.

The CME is expanding its international incentive programmes, which also cover FX products. The programmes will include a simplified fee structure and run until December 31 2010.

GLG Partners has taken on Kaveh Sheibani and Julian Harvey, two of the founders of London-based event-driven fund Pendragon. GLG will become the investment manager of the funds and accounts at Pendragon Capital.

Credit Suisse has announced the formation of a new group in its EMEA global markets solutions business (GMSB) designed to address what co-head of global investment banking Jim Amine describes as a “unique opportunity” presented by the current debt market dislocation.

According to analysts at JPMorgan, there is little certainty among all the doom, gloom and despondency in the financial markets. But although few people can confidently predict the outcome of the global financial crisis, JPMorgan believes it can be relatively sure that 2009 will be a year of less leverage and more regulation.

Academics at the University of Portsmouth are undertaking an unconventional study into new business methods, commissioned by transition consultants Advanced Workplace Associates (AWA).

Key numbers from the equity capital markets in 2008 include $257.4 billion, the value of equity raised by financial sector issuers, accounting for 41% of total ECM volume of $634.4 billion. That’s up from just 11%, the financial sector’s share of new issues in 2007. In 2007, total global ECM volume was $943.7 billion

Why Rohner left UBS

The fallen of Wall Street have a new way to lift their spirits. Apparently, New York bankers’ latest craze is hypnotism.