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Nobody could ever accuse Michel Orlov, president and founder of Black Earth Farming, of lacking the courage of his convictions. As the one-time private equity professional who quit the industry in 2005 to take up the helm of a greenfield farming play in Russia freely admits: "At the time a lot of people thought I was mad."

ING has released a report on the economic and market implications of US obesity. Entitled The fat of the land, the report looks at possible effects on the US economy of the growing numbers of obese people. In 1980, some 15% of Americans were classified as obese, under the (admittedly questionable) BMI method. By 2004, that figure had risen to about 33%.

Flush with petrodollars and ambitious plans, Nigeria’s banks are coming to London. Guaranty Trust Bank, one of Nigeria’s leading banks, has just been authorized by the UK’s Financial Services Authority to operate as a bank in the UK. Its subsidiary, GTB UK, which is based in Margaret Street in London, will focus on commercial activity in areas where there are already established links between Nigeria and the UK and the other countries where it operates, including Gambia and Sierra Leone. The subsidiary will provide banking services such as receiving deposits and writing mortgages for both commercial and retail customers and intermediates.

UK PFI deal taps loan market for entire £2.2 billion.

Just as banks in Russia were beginning to resemble their peers outside the country, engaging in conventional retail and corporate banking, the western financial market crisis hit. Reduced availability of long-term funding from abroad highlights the shortage of such a market in Russia and reveals a systemic vulnerability. Will this help state-owned banks, which had previously been losing market share, turn the tables on their privately owned rivals?

Millennium BCP used to be the star of Portuguese banking. But a period of destructive internal rivalries, abortive takeover bids and dubious strategies made the firm a basket case. Can a new chief executive – seen as a safe pair of hands – rebuild the bank’s capital and revitalize its growth?

The US secondary market in life insurance is being extended to sellers who can ill afford to relinquish their policies.

There may be plenty of doom and gloom among private equity practitioners in the US and western Europe as a result of the global credit crunch that has all but dried up their cheap financing. In Russia, though, the mood among their peers is almost euphoric. "I am amazed by how relatively easy it is to raise money for a private equity fund in Russia," says Florian Fenner, managing partner at UFG Asset Management in Moscow, which is fundraising for its second private equity vehicle. UFG is looking to raise at least $500 million and expects to make a first close at least half that figure in May.

Investment banks are rushing to offer systematic payoffs and smart underlyings as structured notes, partly in response to investors’ growing mistrust of more complex products. But is replicating hedge fund strategies in note form as simple as they are trying to make out?

The crunch has precipitated a world where good credits can turn bad overnight. Research teams must adapt to the new circumstances while clients increasingly have their own expertise. Jethro Wookey reports.