The world's economic and financial leaders at this month's IMF/World Bank meeting will preside over a strengthening global economy. Real GDP will be stronger next year than this. But the reasons differ by region.

Hong Kong is always a party town. The IMF/World Bank meeting can only add to its renown as the city that never stays sober. Delegates will be faced with over eight cocktail parties on Monday 22 September and at least 10 the next day. But which are the ones to be seen at?

Mahathir Mohamad, prime minister of Malaysia, shows an increasing tendency to talk rubbish. Commenting in early September on foreign investor selling of Malaysian stocks and the ringgit, he said: "They are racists. I say it openly. They are not happy to see us prosper."

After two successful privatizations this summer, foreign investors have become highly enthusiastic about Polish stocks. And there's more to come: some 80 companies have applied to the SEC to issue shares before the end of the year, and 60 of these would be IPOs. Antony Currie reports.

The New Zealand economy's been riding a switchback. Stability would offer a welcome breather, as Albert Smith explains.

Taiwan's Shanghai Commercial & Savings Bank is an unknown name in global finance. But this private-sector bank is very special. It gets a top ααα in Euromoney's new emerging market bank (Emba) ratings, covering 450 lesser-known banks. Pakistan's state-owned United Bank came bottom. The ratings go where others have feared to tread. Brian Caplen explains their use as a vital tool for counterparty risk.

Private-sector Brazilian and Argentine institutions top our table of the leading banks in Latin America ranked by shareholders' equity. Commentary by Rebecca Dobson.

For emerging-market bond investors in the know, the former Soviet Union - especially central Asia - is the place to be. Debt markets have rallied across the board, yields are mostly buoyant, and currencies have held their own against the dollar. But title and settlement can sometimes be a little hairy. Theodore Kim investigates the excitement.

Australia's financial markets have hit the headlines this year. While Australian dollar-denominated Eurobonds have been in vogue with European investors, privatization and a changing mortgage market have spurred a wave of issuance by Australian companies. Albert Smith looks at some of the landmark deals.

France's banks are stifled by bureaucratic management, crippled by the over-expansion they undertook in the 1980s and hampered by regulatory obstacles to restructuring. What better time for an outsider with deep pockets to buy into one of the largest banking markets. By John McGrath.

The new South African government's enthusiasm for the free market has surprised some sceptics. But does it have the right plan to tackle the country's problems of entrenched unemployment, fitful economic growth and a heavy dependence on gold exports - not to mention rampant crime? Bruce Cameron reports.

Issuer: World Bank

Foreign banks looking to diversify in international markets have pinpointed Latin America as the new growth area. But whereas in the past they largely confined themselves to investment banking and elite customers they are now seeking to build broader retail operations, either through outright purchases of local banks or buying large stakes in them. Michelle Celarier reports on a race that has sent the prices of even the shakier institutions to surprising levels.

Currency crises in emerging markets are the result of too much foreign capital, not too little. An early warning barometer is a country's "fundamental balance" - current account plus foreign direct investment. But even then, if small economies can't absorb the inflow they should form regional currency blocs. Roll on the Singapore yen, the Polish euro and the Mexican dollar, writes Michael Howell.

Issuer: Republic of Ukraine

In the old days, regulators set the rules and bankers followed them. Now, the Group of Thirty wants to create voluntary standards for global risk management. Some people applaud this experiment. But bankers who Oppose it have been biting their tongues. James Smalhout reports.

The African Development Bank (ADB) gets full marks for its efforts to reform and modernize its operations in what is arguably one of the world's toughest banking environments.

When Armstrong World Industries, a $2 billion US company, announced in early June that it was launching a $354 million hostile takeover of Domco, a Canadian floor-products maker controlled by Sommer Allibert of Paris, investment bankers were surprised to learn that the company's long-time investment banker, Goldman Sachs, was not advising Armstrong.

In the game of Monopoly there's nothing worse than going to jail. Thanks to a bizarre negative-pledge clause written in the mid-1980s, Westpac has suffered the capital markets' equivalent. For more than a decade, it has been locked away from the international bond markets. But not any more. The Australian bank received its get-out-of-jail-free card on August 26. Now, free to borrow without constraint, it is mustard-keen to enter the bond market.

Next month marks the biggest change to London's stock market since Big Bang of 1986. On October 20 the London Stock Exchange (LSE) will replace its current quote-driven system of market-makers with an electronic order book - initially for the market's top 100 shares and later, perhaps, for the whole market. This innovation, accompanied by a number of other changes to trading practices and regulations, will have a major impact on both the liquidity and transparency of the stock market, But it may, inadvertently, erode the LSE's virtual monopoly on securities trading in the UK.

Belt-tightening is not easy, particularly when the belt is an imported fine leather one with a high-priced Louis Vuitton label. As the IMF urges financial self-control, Thailand's elite are finding the austerity package hard to swallow.

Its issuers are good enough for the international capital markets. Investment banks such as Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, and Deutsche Morgan Grenfell are eager lead managers of their deals. Futures contracts on its equity index are listed in Chicago and Singapore. Its stock market has risen by over 30% this year, in stark contrast to neighbours Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines and Thailand whose stock markets have each crashed between 25% and 35%.

It seems anyone from eastern Europe can launch a Eurobond these days.

Credit Suisse First Boston can't keep its staff, it seems, once they've seen Moscow. Less than two years after losing Boris Jordan, who opened the Russian securities market for CSFB and the rest of the world, the firm has parted company with local equities chief Peter Halloran.

Want to buy a biggish local bank at a knock-down price? Join the queue of foreigners bidding for former state-owned banks in central Europe - but watch out for messy loan books and murky questions of ownership. Antony Currie reports on the restructuring of the region's banking systems and profiles three of the newly foreign-owned banks.

It's been the year of the emerging markets with many of Euromoney's 50 best deals of the year coming from key countries such as China, Russia, Brazil and Argentina. Our selection focuses on the important, interesting and innovative transactions from January to August. We have selected five for special mention and also highlighted some deals that were, frankly, dogs. By Robert Minto.

His combative approach - along with $70 billion reserves - has seen off all the currency speculators so far. But does Joseph Yam sleep easy at night?

Rather than demonizing George Soros as the prime mover of the run on their currencies, Asian central bankers need to ask themselves hard questions. Why did the hedge funds go on the attack, and who provided the funding? Do they realize what banks are up to, have they decided which of these activities are legitimate, and are there any effective means of restraint? Laura Covill reports.

Since Anatoly Chubais became finance minister, Russia's stock has risen dramatically. The architect of privatization is now pushing ahead with wide-ranging economic reforms, to the delight of the international community.

Not all the central bank governors in Hong Kong this September for the IMF/World Bank annual meetings are staid middle-aged men in suits.