Global news and insight for corporate financial professionals
NEWSMAKERS: US By Luca Ventura When AG Lafley handpicked Robert McDonald as his successor to the top post at Procter & Gamble in 2009, he could not have predicted that just four years later he would be called ...
DESPERATE TO DIVERSIFY By Kim Iskyan The countries of central Asia are working hard to become more than one-trick ponies, as each struggles in its own way to reduce economic reliance on a single growth driver. The five ...
NEWSMAKERS: ARGENTINA By Paula L. Green Argentine president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner isn’t afraid to tangle with the British, global bondholders, her own judicial system or even the International Monetary Fund. Fernández de Kirchner has until September to ...
MODEL FOR GROWTH? By Vanessa Drucker The Troika’s “darling of reform” is in its third year of recession. Citizens—and policy-makers—want to see the promised economic rebound. Portugal and the European Union depend on one another. On the one ...
A GLOBAL CONNECTION SWIFT’s annual Sibos conference is just around the corner, and this year attendees will gather in Dubai. With Middle Eastern companies following the trend now seen in many emerging markets and increasing the sophistication of their ...
MILESTONES: BANGLADESH By Udayan Gupta Even as Bangladesh tries to extricate itself from the Rana Plaza building collapse, the Dhaka disaster that killed more than 1,100 garment workers, one private equity fund is trying to infuse new capital into ...
SUNSET, OR A NEW SUNRISE? By Michael Shari Brazil faces a monumental challenge in meeting the expectations of its citizens, corporations and global investors over the next several years, as the nation invests heavily to host the World Cup and ...
NEWSMAKERS: ECUADOR By Gordon Platt Five days after Ecuador’s left-leaning president Rafael Correa was inaugurated for a third and final four-year term, the country’s ambassador to the US, Nathalie Cely, addressed a group of business leaders and investors at ...
UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES By Udayan Gupta The world’s central banks are on a desperate mission to stave off deflation. But even if their short-term fixes work, the long-term outcomes may have unplanned results. Central banks are in an ...
NEWSMAKERS: ITALY By Gilly Wright “Italy is dying from austerity alone. Growth policies cannot wait,” announced Italy’s new premier, Enrico Letta, in his first keynote speech. Can Letta pass reforms with weak coalition partners? Saying that priorities would ...
WAITING FOR THE RENAISSANCE By Gordon Platt Egypt’s elections promised much in terms of building a modern and democratic state. But the realities of governing for the Muslim Brotherhood are proving more difficult than initially thought—and some economic ...
MILESTONES: LUXEMBOURG By Forrest Jones Another tax haven is set to unveil its operations, this time in Western Europe. Luxembourg recently agreed to share confidential banking details belonging to multinational companies with its neighbors. The move, which will help ...
NEWSMAKERS: SPAIN By Luca Ventura Appointed as chief executive of Santander in 2002, Alfredo Sáenz took less than a decade to turn the Spanish domestic lender into a multinational giant with operations in 40 countries. New CEO Marín kept a ...
NEWSMAKERS: CANADA By Joel Kranc Few people were completely surprised when Mark Carney, the head of the Bank of Canada, broke the news earlier this year that he was leaving his post to head up the Bank of England. ...
NEWSMAKERS: ICELAND By Valentina Pasquali Back to the future is the theme in Iceland after voters rejected the austerity policies of the left-of-center government in power for the past four years and reinstalled the same center-right coalition that presided over ...
We live in a world of quantitative easing and short-term interest rates close to zero; a world where central banks have recently taken on a new role, becoming the most active institutional investors in the world...
ODD MAN OUT By Dan Keeler One of the few frontier markets to adopt the euro, Estonia has proved to be a beacon of hope in a region of uncertainty. Estonia is on a healthy trajectory. Economic ...
MILESTONES: MALAYSIA By Thomas Clouse Malaysia’s National Front coalition will extend its 56-year reign by another five years after maintaining its parliamentary majority in a tightly contested and controversial election. The National Front, a group of political parties led ...
NEWSMAKERS: VENEZUELA By Paula L. Green Everyone from consumers weary of battling rising inflation to importers wrestling with a devalued currency and foreign and domestic investors whose companies were nationalized will have a stake in the actions Nelson José Merentes ...
MILESTONES: ITALY By Valentina Pasquali The general elections held in Italy in February yielded a hung parliament, marked the phenomenal rise of the little-understood protest movement of former comedian Beppe Grillo, and unexpectedly revived the flagging political career of former ...