Who killed Wall Street?
You don’t have to break a sweat to be a finance skeptic these days. So let’s remind ourselves how compelling the logic of the financial innovation that led us to our current predicament seemed not too long ago. Who wouldn’t want credit markets to serve the cause of home ownership? So we start by introducing […]
Ethical business
Research recently carried out by Ethical Investment Research Services (EIRIS), a research organisation designed to reflect the investment principles of the group of churches and charities that helped set it up, found that the top listed companies on the London Stock Exchange have made great strides in the past five years to tackle ethical issues […]
A waiting game
The OECD sounded cautiously optimistic when it published its latest economic outlook in the middle of September. “Banks appear to have recognised most of the losses and write-downs related to sub-prime based securities,” it said. Yet within days, Lehman Brothers had slumped into bankruptcy protection, Bank of America had stepped in to bail our Merrill […]
Blooming portfolio
Instead of being defeated by the political upheavals in Lebanon, the nation’s leading financial institution has acquired valuable banking lessons from repeated domestic crises as it embarks on a second wave of growth beyond its home borders. Blom Bank is parlaying its historic reputation for low-risk, innovative trade finance into full-service operations in some of […]
Captain’s knock
Editor’s note This is an archived article. For the cover story concerning Sir Allen Stanford please click here. Sir Allen’s new and innovative cricketing enterprise is merely the latest innings in a business empire that spans financial services to upmarket real estate development, hospitality and professional sports. We talked to the Sir Allen about his […]
The rising sun
Japan’s big banks, unburdened by heavy subprime losses, and stuck with sputtering growth at home, are once again investing and lending abroad, but investors should not expect a string of blockbuster buyouts. Only a few years removed from a bad-loan crisis that pushed many lenders to the brink of collapse and sparked widespread industry consolidation, […]
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A long a painful journey
Just how bad is the global economic outlook? The lack of a consensus answer to that question is telling. Normally, the financial institutions that steer the world economy show a degree of agreement. But these are uncertain times. The International Monetary Fund said recently that the credit crunch had cost financial firms a stunning $945bn; […]
Hungary: a magnet for FDI
As a result of EU accession on May 1, 2004, investors in Hungary find themselves in a single market of 493 million consumers with enormous potential for developing new markets and new horizons. At the geographical centre of the region Hungary is destined to become a bridge between present EU members and those countries on […]
The pole position – a blessing or a curse for FDI?
Slovenia’s business makeover has not been a bumpy ride experienced by other economies in transition at the beginning of the 1990s. Slovenian companies were a target for foreign interest as early as in the late 1970s thanks to Slovenia’s manufacturers of household appliances, cars and commercial vehicles, furniture and garments. Conveniently nestled between Austria and […]
