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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.

Deutsche Bank is taking a 40% strategic stake in Russian fund manager UFG Invest, one of the top 10 players in the Russian asset management industry. Under the terms of the agreement between the two firms, Deutsche will have the option to increase its holding to 100%. Deutsche’s existing fund business, DWS Investments, will be combined with UFG Invest and the new entity will be branded Deutsche UFG Capital Management. "[This] transaction further strengthens our role in Russia," says Igor Lojevsky, chief executive of Deutsche Bank Russia.

Several of Deutsche Bank’s clients had problems with the pricing they were getting electronically when they have came to roll positions forward at the end of September. When these have been queried on the telephone, the prices have apparently been requoted more accurately in line with prevailing rates in the market.

Saxo Bank, despite reporting increased profitability, has shed about a third of its workforce. About 300 jobs have been axed at its Copenhagen headquarters, with up to 50 disappearing in London. The bank is believed to be reviewing its operations in both Singapore and Switzerland in particular. The cost-cutting comes after Saxo embarked on a spell of rapid and aggressive expansion. Its staffing level is now virtually back to where it was a year ago.

The US economy is far more resilient than some commentators think. The present crisis also creates an opportunity for the Treasury to help itself and many pension funds.

Short of a radical restructuring of the banking sector, the US government bailout will prompt a market rally. However the longer-term effects will be deleterious.

As the region’s stock markets tumble and the international bond market shows no sign of opening, Latin American companies in need of cash are turning to plan B. "The loan market is still open in Brazil. There is also securitization. At the moment there is a plan B beyond the international bond market that will work for many Latin companies, especially for those in Brazil," Dan Vallimarescu, head of debt capital markets at Santander, told Euromoney just days after Lehman Brothers’ collapse. "Several issuers are getting a bank deal done quietly," says Chris Gilfond, joint head of Latin American debt at Citi. "People are also staying local and/or regional. For example, in Mexico and Peru the local debt capital markets business has been doing very well."

Colombia’s financial institutions continue to be in good shape. They expect record profits for 2008, despite the global turmoil. For the first seven months of 2008, the Colombian banking system reported a net profit of $1.43 billion, a 30.9% increase on the same period in 2007. "Last year was a record year for Citi Colombia in terms of profit and growth, but we expect to close this year with even better profit growth rates," says Francisco Aristeguieta, country head of Citi Colombia and head of the Andean region for Citi.