There could scarcely be a greater contrast: in the financial heart of Zurich, in restrained classical grandeur, Credit Suisse and Union Bank of Switzerland make the Bahnhofstrasse neighbourhood still more stately--and in obscure back streets lurk their foreign competitors.

It was like the meeting of two big and powerful families, the Medici and the Strozzi in Florence, or the Gambinos and the Bonannos in New York. But this was April 22, 1986.

When Armin Mattle of UBS made Stanley Ross run for cover, it was a sign of just how unpopular the grey market had become.