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Has the credit crunch led even the brightest students to lose all interest in the financial services industry?

"For the rest of the bank, we’re actually managing the businesses; with the problem assets we’re not really managing them at all, we’re just managing the accounting"

Lebanon’s banks are slowly moving away from their traditional reliance on sovereign debt – but not because they lack faith in their own country. Alex Warren reports from Beirut.

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

Even as they delever, shed assets, raise capital and hoard liquidity against further hits, banks know they must also fundamentally change the rotten underlying business practices that led them to disaster. If they can’t, even those that manage to survive this disaster will fall victim to the next. That’s if the regulators don’t shut them down first. Peter Lee reports on an industry trying to relearn the basics.

Central bank governor Martin Redrado is confident he can win the fight against inflation, but investors are sceptical of Kirchner’s policies.

The SEC and the FSA have both acted too hastily in reacting to short selling. In the UK, the new disclosure rules have compounded the turbulent mood of the market. Neil Wilson reports.

Some European banks are coming through the credit crisis relatively unscathed, or even with enhanced market positions and reputations. Never has differentiation been more important.

"We have all the signs of emerging markets in the US now – there’s stagflation, growing unemployment, excess debt, poor monetary management – I just wonder when the US will be included in the EMBI+"

One of the puzzles of Islamic finance is how Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim nation, has been so utterly left behind in its development. Nearby Malaysia has evolved the most sophisticated regulatory environment for Islamic finance anywhere in the world and, after building an admirable domestic base, has now opened its doors to foreign entrants. Several Gulf states, notably Bahrain, have built centres of excellence around Shariah-compliant finance; and even less-developed nations such as Pakistan are making up for a slow start and witnessing a boom in this growing area.

Markets are more susceptible to the herd mentality and the creation of bubbles because of agents’ behaviour. Following the money can solve a large part of the asset price puzzle.

Concerns about an economic slowdown now weigh on capital markets.