Search results for

Reform is on the agenda for Morocco, although the king still wields comprehensive power. New openings are being sought to rebalance an economy dependent on tourism and to overcome stubbornly high unemployment. Rupert Wright reports.

Elliott Associates' founder Paul Singer learnt the hard way that good investment returns can only be achieved consistently if hedging is rigorously applied and opportunities to add value ruthlessly pursued. Felix Salmon reports.

Regulation, historical rivalries, investor scepticism, language barriers and egos all stand in the way of large bank mergers in western Europe, where consolidation stalled at the end of the 1990s. Unless these obstacles can be overcome, leading European banks will be swallowed by US financial institutions just as soon as they have finished digesting their domestic acquisitions. Katie Martin reports.

It's bonus time ? and not everyone's going to be as lucky as Goldman Sachs trader Driss Ben-Brahim, who has just landed a reputed £30 million.

A $5 billion loan is not to be dismissed lightly in a country where foreign investment is running at just $1 billion a year. But the mystery benefactor is a company whose name rings no bells and whose principal investors have yet to be identified. It could only happen in Turkey. Metin Munir reports.

If a UK tabloid is to be believed, Coutts is about to offer Prince William (pictured, left) more than just a bank account. William ? second in line to the throne ? is considering a career with Coutts when he graduates from St Andrews University, according to the Sunday Mirror.

Companies with a higher representation of women in senior management positions financially outperform companies with proportionally fewer women at the top, according to a new study by Catalyst, a research and advisory organization working to advance women in business.

Key technology issues facing CFOs this year were largely the same as last year, with the top two issues cited remaining as prioritizing technology investments and identifying the appropriate level of technology investment.

The cost of Sarbanes-Oxley compliance for US-domiciled European companies is an issue CFOs need to address; and address soon. 2005 is fast approaching, and delays will prove expensive.

IFRS (International Financial Reporting Standards), which will be mandatory for EU-listed, Australian and certain Russian companies from 2005, makes constant reference to value: recoverable value, residual value, fair value and so on. Entities are now formally required to evaluate for all assets whether the future economic benefits expected justify the value attributed to the asset. Of course, entities were always required to consider whether the carrying value of an asset in the accounts was appropriate, but now this process will be more transparent.

Sarbanes-Oxley (SOx) news might regularly dominate headlines in the US but will similar legislation be enacted around the world? According to a recent survey by GTNews, only 48% of western European respondents thought other geographical locations should adopt Sarbanes-Oxley style legislation, compared to 59% for global respondents.