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So you think the euro is having a rough ride? What you've seen is a deliberate devaluation strategy from the political hard core. But, because of the structural flaws in euroland the present regime won't cure the euro's inherent weakness. Expect to see the European Central Bank tending one sick patient after another, predicts Bernard Connolly.

It's been party time in Lebanon. At the Baalbek music festival, Vanessa Mae, the violinist renowned at least as much for her sexy image as for her playing, wowed 4,000 at the Temple of Jupiter. At the Beiteddine palace, Tito Puente and Celia Cruz brought salsa and mambo to the Chouf. And in Tyre, Iraqi-born Kazem al-Saher drew the biggest crowd of all, packing 5,000 people into the Hippodrome on a sultry Friday evening.

Emerging market banks: Problems unsolved

Tentatively at first, then in a growing rush of enthusiasm, the first corporate bonds in the new single currency began to appear in January. Before long, scores of companies were clamouring to reach this broad, new investor base. Then came confusion in pricing and growing investor disenchantment. But the restructuring of Europe should mean that the continent's corporate bond market is here to stay. And as investors learn to tell the good deals from the bad, it is beginning to acquire depth and maturity. Rebecca Bream reports

Some swap counterparties of defunct Hong Kong investment bank Peregrine are claiming a double discount on what they owe its liquidators. Ridiculous? Perhaps, but uncertain enough for an appeal to a UK court. The implications, for swap documentation and close-out netting with poor-credit counterparties, could be huge. By David Shirreff.

The Pfandbrief market is now the single biggest bond market in Europe. The jumbo market, which accounts for 25% of Pfandbrief issuance, grew by 80% in 1998 and is now bigger than several European government bond markets. We asked eight key players where this market is going.

As bankers pack off for the August break to their summer playgrounds, their Caribbean beach-side or Tuscan villas, or to their yachts, many will reflect uneasily on a tumultuous 12 months in global financial markets. This time a year ago, few could have guessed what a tornado was about to engulf them. News of the political and economic crisis in Russia filtered across the sunblock-scented airwaves in August. Within weeks, a huge speculative bubble in emerging-market debt that had built up in the first half of 1998 suddenly burst. Investors, traders and banks scrambled for margin and liquidity, spreads on all but the safest government bonds blew out as financial markets deleveraged, stocks tumbled and the dollar had its biggest ever one-day fall against the yen. The Federal Reserve found itself brokering the bail-out of an obscure hedge fund, which, had it collapsed, might have plunged the markets into catastrophe.

Asset Management: A derivatives approach to index tracking

From cement makers to oil companies, from first-time issuers to regular borrowers, corporates big and small are targeting European investors with bond issues. How have they fared?

Emerging market banks: Problems unsolved

Euroland finally seems to be accelerating. Price stability has been achieved and few question its sustainability. The bond market is a clear success for the euro and a broad range of borrowers have emerged. We should not view these developments as a flash in the pan. The European Commission has come up with a plan, Graham Bishop considers its implications.

NatWest's out of town success story