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Bond markets are moved back into difficult trading as market making is proving inadequate faced with large-scale liquidation even of quality bonds by funds facing margin calls or redemptions.

In October the credit crunch finally devastated global equity markets as investor panic threatened to bring down all but the very strongest banks. Alex Chambers was pounding the sidewalks of New York just as the crisis entered its most tumultuous period and perhaps its denouement.

The credit crisis is prompting corporate treasuries to make efficient use of their cash. But it has also thrown up doubts about how secure short-term investment vehicles such as money market funds are. Laurence Neville reports.

A three-way merger of Costa Rica’s largest state-owned banks to help deal with desperate funding shortages and reduce their operating expenses is not without its drawbacks. Chloe Hayward reports from San José.

For the hundreds of hedge funds caught up in the collapse of Lehman Brothers International’s prime brokerage, it might take years to claw back securities entrusted as collateral. Some face destruction through rehypothecation. It’s the first case of its type, and now the entire structure of prime brokerage is under scrutiny.

Before corporate treasurers can begin to weigh their investment options, it is essential to create a liquidity management structure that gives both subsidiaries and head office the most advantageous set-up to minimize costs and maximize returns – while leaving sufficient cash where it is needed to pay day-to-day expenses.

The $473 million Kalamazoo (Mich.) Retirement System is considering shifting its entire real estate portfolio into private real estate investment trusts and is in the process of assessing global managers to present to the board at the next meeting Nov. 19. Kalamzoo’s real estate portfolio has an aggregate $23 million between the city and county plans. It is split 50/50 between public and private REITs. Private REITs have lower volatility and less correlation to the equity market than public REITs, said Board Chair Bob Salisbury.

Includes Bonds, Equities, Loans, M&A, MTN, Project Finance

The European Commission could seriously damage structured finance, say speakers.

Or, put another way, I have come to bury FXMarketSpace (FXMS), not to praise it.

Was leverage responsible for driving some FX rates to extreme levels? And is its withdrawal causing those same rates to move back to their longer-term equilibrium rates in some cases and below them in others?

Call me old fashioned, but I still believe in the old Forex Associations motto of ‘My word is my bond’. But it seems that a few of the talented crop of dealers and sales people who work in the market no longer feel the same.