Risk & Insurance

Jim Rossman is managing director of the corporate preparedness group at Lazard, the M&A advisory and asset management giant. A former M&A lawyer at Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton, Rossman talked with Global Finance about how to fend off hostile takeovers—mainly in the US, but also in Europe and emerging markets.

Corporate leaders can be forgiven for not thinking too far ahead. The length of time that investors hold stock has fallen. Share-holders want fast rewards—and quick fixes when performance flags. Moreover, given the upheavals and macroeconomic uncertainties of the past decade, many CEOs and CFOs have been preoccupied with firefighting.

Management | Risk Management
Cyberattacks, safety concerns, climate change, regulatory demands, declining oil prices, less demand from China, a crumbling and volatile stock market: There is no lack of risks in doing business, and at the start of 2016, they are ever- present for corporations small and large.

The axe fell on Brazil heading into 2016 as it suffered a downgrade to junk status by Fitch Ratings, heightening the air of crisis as the beleaguered nation grapples with political turmoil and recession.

Security Risks | Management
Recent terrorist events around the world, from California to Paris, have forced multinational companies to think more seriously about security and nonmarket risks, and the impact of threats on their operations and business continuity.

Big oil companies waited for years to see if anyone could successfully tap into Arctic oil reserves.

Real-time payment remains the holy grail of global transaction processing. And like the grail, it remains elusive.

Capital Markets | M&A Antitrust
Antitrust authorities around the world are stepping up their merger-monitoring activities amid a boom in cross-border M&A. They’re increasingly requiring merging companies to divest assets to win approval for their deals. In some cases, complex requirements are causing corporates to abandon proposed combinations.

Capital Markets | Derivatives
Life may have just become a bit easier for finance executives at companies with captive finance units—which is to say, almost all automakers and scores of equipment manufacturers.

Special Report | Pensions & Benefits Management
Combating economic trends, regulators and even demographics, funds are forced to think outside the box.

SEC & Executive Compensation | Five years after the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform act, several of its controversial corporate governance provisions on executive compensation continue to wend their way through the system.

Newsmakers | Nicaragua
When Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega announced last December a plan to construct a controversial transoceanic waterway that would provide an alternative to the Panama Canal, he vowed the project would create jobs and bring prosperity to the hemisphere’s second-poorest nation.

Management | Hedging
The dramatic slide in oil prices over the past year or so has once again underscored the value—and perils—of hedging. Some companies and governments bet on a fall in the cost of crude and thereby obviated large losses. Others did not make out so well.

Capital Markets | Fixed Income
Hungary’s biggest financial scandal, which broke earlier this year, involved the alleged issuance of more than $500 million of phony bonds by Quaestor Financial Hrurira. The brokerage was one of three firms charged with fraud.

Milestones | Singapore
During the state funeral cortege of Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore’s founding prime minister, Singaporeans were urged to salute rather than take photos using their smartphones, a vivid reminder of the government’s preoccupation with political correctness.

Milestones | Iran
It may have taken 12 years to reach, but the framework agreement struck between the so-called P5+1 (Russia, China, France, Britain, and the US, plus Germany), the European Union and Iran has enough momentum, say analysts, to yield a full accord by June 30.

Country Report | Morocco
With a diversified economic base and improving fundamentals, Morocco has a sound fiscal strategy and well-thought-out reform program to cut red tape and boost trade. But further reform, says the IMF, is needed.

Milestones | Cyprus
The enormous economic challenges faced by Greece have overshadowed a different kind of drama elsewhere in the Mediterranean.

Newsmakers | Switzerland
Swiss giant Credit Suisse stepped out of the industry’s traditional talent pool in March when it hired Tidjane Thiam as chief executive.

with Jan Rasmussen, Nordea Markets