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Showing the new face of Asia

Solid performers that buck the trend

Solid performers that buck the trend

Just a year ago, project finance was wallowing in liquidity. The Asian crisis has brought about a dramatic reversal. New and revived approaches ­ project bonds, club deals, indexation, hedging, more use of political risk insurance ­ have so far proved only partly successful in getting the business back on the road. James Featherstone reports.

Although the Greek government's macroeconomic policy continues to alienate the electorate, investors are being attracted in their droves to an economy now firmly on track for meeting the European Union's Maastricht criteria by 2001. International confidence is growing rapidly, evidenced not least by the performance of Greek equities and bonds. Philip Moore reports.

When emerging markets go wobbly, strong, solidly performing companies are thrown into relief. Euromoney looks at nine of Latin America's best. They have in common steady demand for their products and services but also a determination to seek efficiency and financial soundness. Alex Mathias reports.

Chinese premier Zhu Rongji had been slowly drawing the net around the country's second biggest investment and trust company long before the outside world or indeed the company's own executives knew what was happening. He sent trusted aides to Guangdong where they worked quietly for months to flush out financial irregularities and clean up the scandal-ridden province. Their investigations led to the shutdown of Guangdong International Trust and Investment Company (Gitic).

Showing the new face of Asia

Solid performers that buck the trend

Ecuador's bankers are scratching their heads wondering how to design products to accommodate a radical new 1% tax on capital transactions, which from January will replace traditional income tax. The tax will be withheld from bank customers whenever a deposit is made into an account or for a fixed-term investment, or when a cheque is cashed. Customers will not be charged, however, when money is withdrawn from an ATM. It is feared that the tax will lead to further distortions - the financial system already has a huge quantity of transactions that don't always provide added value but which are operationally necessary - and to tax avoidance by conducting transactions outside the system, says analysts.

Internet IPOs were once regarded as highly risky. Now they rank among the best-received offerings in the global marketplace. The rapid rise in internet use has driven the perception that service providers will be worth a lot of money, and now everyone is trying to get a piece of the action. Yet the euphoria surrounding recent flotations of internet stocks may be hiding a less rosy picture for hi-tech issuers as a whole. Peter Lee reports.

At long last, lawyers are going to have to start writing in plain English - or are they? By Christopher Stoakes