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Hans de Gier, chairman and chief executive of Warburg Dillon Read, didn't mince words at the grand opening of the Financial Services Authority (FSA) in Canary Wharf on June 1. Batting third in an impressive line-up of speakers, he warned that the FSA's approach to regulation risked "embodying the worst of both worlds: high-level principles interpreted and applied separately from detailed rules designed on a one-size-fits-all basis".

Is it time for foreigners to cut their losses and get out of the Thai securities business, or is it a unique buying opportunity while business is depressed? As part of a global retreat from equities Barclays Capital has sold its 49% stake in Bangkok Securities only 18 months after purchase. But Merrill Lynch executives are excited about its new venture Merrill Lynch Phatra Securities which links it with one of the country's leading institutions, Thai Farmers Bank.

Was Goldman sleeping, did its client just not listen, or was Energy Group simply too clever? After a year of dithering, PacifiCorp let its UK target slip into Texan hands. The only thing that didn't fall through the cracks was the fees for Goldman and the other investment banks. Antony Currie reports.

"Caspian has never been in better shape to take advantage of market conditions in the whole of its history." So said Caspian Securities' founder, Christopher Heath, speaking to Euromoney in March of this year. Four months on and Caspian, the investment bank dedicated solely to emerging markets, is no more.

Awards of Excellence

The financial markets have never stood still. But rarely have they moved as quickly as they do today. The winners of all our awards by product sector are facing the same forces. Globalization is driving the market and firms are responding by consolidating. Take a careful look at the winners. They are sure to be very different next year.

Can Europe produce a top-tier global investment bank? The British have proved they can't. BZW and NatWest Markets were disasters and though they have spawned successful offshoots, Barclays Capital and Greenwich NatWest are to British investment banking what Greg Rusedski is to British tennis - technically British, actually North American. Bob Diamond and Tom Kalaris are ex-CSFB and JP Morgan respectively, and NatWest bought Chip Kruger and Gary Holloway's Greenwich Capital whole.

A reserved young man in a business better known for exuberant individuality, Nicolas Rohatyn perfectly embodies the JP Morgan of the late 1990s.

Issuer: Russian Federation

Gardening leave for overworked bankers is perhaps one of the more agreeable spin-offs when one bank buys another. A recent beneficiary is Carol Barazzone, the former head of global equity syndicate at BZW, who quit in April four months after the sale to CSFB.

In Korea they call him the Baekmanbur-man, or the million-dollar man. Korea's first - and perhaps only - million dollar analyst surprised everyone last month when he decided to return to his old firm, four years after he'd left it.

Experienced Japan watchers are getting ever gloomier about the country's prospects. They cannot see any way out of the present gridlock. The banks, all their time and resources focused on non-performing assets, have reduced new lending so dramatically that the real economy is grinding to a halt. The rate of corporate bankruptcy is increasing and each new Tankan survey is more despairing than the last. Lack of liquidity is forcing good as well as bad out of business, creating more problems for the banks and forcing them to cut lending further.