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Edited by Steven Irvine

Competition in French banking is distorted by an outdated legal framework. French banks need to be downsized and made more profitable. Their returns on equity and cost/income ratios are deplorable. Strong statements. But those aren't Euromoney's views, they're the views of Marc Viénot, chairman of one of France's biggest banks, Société Générale. He spoke to Felix Salmon

The Euromoney country risk assessment uses nine categories that fall into three broad groups: analytical indicators, credit indicators and market indicators. The weighted scores are calculated as follows: the highest score in each category receives the full mark for the weighting; the lowest receives zero. In between, figures are calculated according to the formula: Final score = weighting/(maximum score minimumscore) x (score minimum score). The country risk ranking shows only the final scores after weighting.

Despite measures by some governments to curb expenditure, withdeflationary effects on economic growth, the health of Arab banks remains good.Banks from the Gulf Cooperation Council states, particularly Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, continue to dominate the top 100 rankings. Martin Gallagher and Andrew Ioannou analyze the latest results.

On his first day as treasurer of the World Bank ­ March 1 this year Gary Perlin was winding up a trip to China, the bank's biggest borrower. By contrast, the first overseas trip of his predecessor Jessica Einhorn (now promoted to managing director) was to Japan, the biggest investor in the bank's bonds.

The world's big borrowers have found a new source of super-cheap funding. In the past year, a group of small, hitherto almost unheard of Japanese institutions ­ most famously the Teachers' Pension Fund ­ have bought as much as $100 billion of structured Euro-MTNs. So desperate are these investors for certain types of securities that a top-rated borrower can raise funds via a private placement in Japan for as little as Libor minus 60 basis points. Garry Evans explains how

Robert Rubin, secretary of the US treasury, has faced tough situations and made tough decisions. In a remarkably short time, he dealt with the Mexico crisis and put the dollar back on course, demonstrating a rare grasp of both domestic politics and global markets. By Katharine Morton

Antonio Fazio, governor of the Banca d'Italia since May 1993, has steered the Italian economy towards low inflation and further enhanced the central bank's reputation for independence.

Slovenia was in economic pole position in eastern Europe when communism collapsed in 1990. But it has now fallen behind its neighbours, held back by lack of investment and political uncertainty in the former Yugoslavia. Many companies are 60% owned by management and employees, and often do not welcome outside investors. The investment companies formed to buy into privatization have disappointed, with few taking a positive approach. This could be starving Slovenia of much-needed funds. Gavin Gray reports

Over the past year, Roberto De Ocampo has more than vindicated his award of 1995's Euromoney Finance Minister of the Year. He goes from strength to strength, as part of a team under President Fidel Ramos that has brought the Philippines from being the sick man of Asia to become one of its star performers.

Watch out! A hit squad of World Bank auditors could be making a surprise visit to a project near you. This is the Bank's first serious attempt, led by president James Wolfensohn, to address corruption head on. But nailing the culprits ­ some of them dictators and governments ­ is not so easy. By Michelle Celarier

Managing director and head of fixed-income trading and sales, West Merchant Bank Limited