Africa’s abundant mineral resources are attracting investment from Russian companies. What’s more, the Russians are proving more popular with Africans than westerners and the Chinese. Elliot Wilson reports.

Northern Rock’s inability to tap the wholesale funding market is a body blow for the whole sector.

When the investment trust structure appeared four years ago, the securitization market jerked into action and local banks jumped on a growing opportunity. Now foreign banks are taking a fresh look at the market, eyeing the rich pickings that are emerging from securitizing receivables for corporates, banks and states. Chloe Hayward reports from São Paulo.

Serbia’s minister of the economy and former finance minister is uncompromising – and his approach has been crucial to the revival of his country’s economic fortunes.

Banks have come to realize that to make money from emissions trading markets they would do well to tie up with the consultants that understand the technicalities and with the corporates that own Clean Development Mechanism schemes. Peter Koh reports.

Standard & Poor’s has bought software services company Imake Consulting and ABSXchange, a portal for structured finance data, analytics and modelling.

Mortgage securitization by Brazilian banks has huge potential as the mortgage market is still worth only 2.2% of GDP.

After an absence of almost half a century, private-sector banks are once again doing business in Syria. Some three years after the first pioneers opened their doors, the country’s economic landscape is still in full transformation – and competition is beginning to heat up. Alex Warren reports.

Often accused of being unwilling to make use of cutting-edge investment techniques, Japanese institutions are more and more attracted to the heady mix of strong ratings and high yields offered by structured credit. But the development of the market is threatened from several directions, and some worry that an over-cautious investor base could prove as dangerous as a reckless one. Lawrence White reports from Tokyo.

The Brazilian has brought a sense of euphoria back to the country and established it one of the four key emerging nations, as part of the Bric group.

Mohammad-Jafaar Mojarrad, deputy governor of the Central Bank of Iran, speaks to Mark Johnson about the bank’s efforts to control inflation, curb exchange rate instability and cope with the difficult security situation.

The disappearance of both CP investors and ABS buyers in August had grave consequences for those vehicles that rely on both.

UNTIL RECENTLY, INDIA occupied a hazy part of the average global investment banking CEO’s brain marked "untapped potential". That fuzziness has been wiped clean this year. Investment banks are piling into India, snapping up experienced local and expatriate talent, completing multi-billion dollar cross-border mergers, and establishing cost-efficient data centres employing thousands of skilled engineers.

Africa is the last frontier. There is nowhere attracting more pioneers than Nigeria. With its large and innovative workforce, its attractions are obvious. But is it safe as an investment? Rupert Wright reports from Lagos.

While one country goes from strength to strength, the rest of Latin America is seeing very slow growth in funds. Helen Avery looks at the opportunities available to managers in the region.

Families have always dominated the economies of the Gulf, controlling huge amounts of wealth and influence but traditionally unwilling to open up their capital – and their books – to the outside world. That model is gradually starting to change, says Alex Warren.

Tamweel controls one-third of Dubai’s burgeoning mortgage market. In the wake of the company’s issuance of the Gulf’s first ever internationally rated securitization, Dominic O’Neill talks to the company’s CFO and CEO.

In emerging markets fixed income, three investors have raised themselves to superstar status. Mohamed El-Erian, Simon Treacher and Jerome Booth have all earned enviable reputations. Raphael Kassin’s move from ABN Amro to Credit Suisse could place him in the same firmament. Julian Marshall reports.

Liquidity in the global debt and bank markets is scarce but judging by the action of Brazil’s leading private equity firm, the financial crisis has yet to hit Latin America’s biggest economy. São Paulo-based GP Investments has entered into one of the biggest leveraged buyouts in Brazil, in what is expected to be the first of many similar transactions. In August, the private equity firm agreed to acquire 100% of Pride International’s Latin American Land Drilling and E&P Services businesses for $1 billion in cash. The transaction is expected to close by the end of the third quarter.