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Moody’s says that it intends to keep GMAC’s senior unsecured Ba1 rating under review for the time being, breaking its rule of resolving ratings within three months of announcing a review.

Peter Weinberg, former head of European investment banking at Goldman Sachs, will join former Morgan Stanley star banker Joseph Perella in his as yet unnamed investment banking boutique. Perella left Morgan Stanley last April during the battle over the leadership of the firm and soon after was sole adviser to MBNA on its $35.8 billion sale to Bank of America.

The only court-sanctioned committee representing shareholders in the Winn-Dixie Chapter 11 restructuring has been disbanded by a US Justice Department official at the request of a group of unsecured creditors. This leaves shareholders without any official representation in the reorganization plans of the chain-store group.

According to data from research company HFR, the number of hedge funds going bust is rising rapidly. In 2005 to the end of the third quarter an estimated 484 funds went into liquidation, 81.8% more than in the whole of 2004.

It might make sense for hedge funds to buy traditional asset managers. When Citigroup sold off its asset management arm to Legg Mason last year, leaving the focus on its separate alternatives business, it supported the belief of many in the market that traditional asset management was becoming something of a dinosaur.

It seems that some banks will pull out all the stops to feature prominently in Euromoney’s influential FX poll. Word filters through of gifts being sent out and clients being lavished with entertainment. The managing director of one prominent bank was so eager to start the lobbying process that he emailed Euromoney asking: “Fri 5pm: should I unleash hell? Is the site ready? Let the games commence...” Just exactly which games he was about to unleash in hell is unclear, but one of his disgruntled clients has complained of being hassled, almost non-stop, to vote. “I told all the banks I’d fill it [the poll] in when I was ready, not before,” he moaned.

As gold has traded up to 25-year highs, the Canadian dollar has weakened, despite the products’ strong long-term correlation. Does this mean that the relationship has broken down?

Foreign hedge fund managers registering with the SEC might be caught out by a NASD ruling on IPOs, say lawyers. Foreign managers investing in US or non-US IPOs are subject to the US securities regulator’s ‘new issue’ ruling if those managers use a US broker/dealer.

Those banks distributing goodies in the hope of influencing the poll (against the rules, we hasten to add) might do well to remember that clients are often an ungrateful bunch. Apparently, one Japanese client of a UK clearing bank complained about the iPod Shuffles it received for Christmas. It was not the fact that iPods are made by one of its competitors that caused the problem. No, it was the fact that the Shuffle is at the bottom of the iPod range.

The growing number of FX transactions being settled through CLS Bank is strong evidence that the market is still expanding.

The biggest LBO club deals of 2005 will soon be surpassed.

SAB Miller, the world’s third-largest brewer, announced in January its intention to establish a brewery in Vietnam through a 50:50 joint venture with Vinamilk, Vietnam’s leading dairy products company. The $45 million venture will be based near Ho Chi Minh City and will make use of Vinamilk’s extensive distribution network. The aim is to develop a Vietnamese beer brand that will be supported by a premium SAB Miller brand.