Hildebrand Out At SNB After Wife’s FX Trading Binge

NEWSMAKERS: SWITZERLAND   By Valentina Pasquali   In the midst of Europe's sovereign debt crisis, a scandal hit the beleaguered continent's financial system in January.   Hildebrand forced out of Swiss Central Bank role The head of Switzerland's central bank, ...

Passera Faces Tough Job To Win Over Italian Parliament

NEWSMAKERS: ITALY   By Paula Green   Ready or not, as minister of economic development, infrastructure and transport for the newly-formed government of prime minister Mario Monti, Italian banker-turned-bureaucrat Corrado Passera will be honing his political skills this year.   ...

Rajoy Hopes To Reassure Investors In Spain

NEWSMAKERS: SPAIN   By Valentina Pasquali   Like Greece and Italy, Spain too has a new government, tasked with bringing the country back from the brink.   Rajoy heads new government Unlike Greece’s Lucas Papademos and Italy’s Mario Monti, Spain’s prime ...

The Italian Job

NEWSMAKERS: ITALY   By Anita Hawser   As yields on Italian debt crept above 7% in mid-November, all eyes were on Italy as the next house of cards that could come tumbling down in the eurozone.   Bini Smaghi out ...

Daunting Tasks For Papademos

NEWSMAKERS: EUROPE   By Valentina Pasquali   Greece’s interim prime minister Lucas Papademos was appointed in November, after much squabbling between the country’s two main political parties.   Papademos most qualified candidate for the job Papademos faces the daunting tasks ...

Madeira Debts Add To Portuguese Concerns

MILESTONES: PORTUGAL   By Matt Greco   With the government of Portugal announcing one austerity measure after another to meet IMF-imposed budgetary guidelines and as the rating agencies hack away at the credit-worthiness of the country’s financial institutions, new revelations ...

Trichet Exits From ECB

NEWSMAKERS: EUROPE   By Anita Hawser   At the press conference that followed the European Central Bank’s Governing Council meeting on October 6 in Berlin, few would have guessed that it was Jean-Claude Trichet’s last meeting as ECB president.   ...

Strong Investor Interest In Irish Bonds

MILESTONES: IRELAND   By Matt Greco   In Ireland each day’s financial developments seem to bring either a positive surprise or a mild disappointment.   Irish four- and eight-year bond sales in September generated the greatest one-day increase in price ...

Denmark Extends Claim In Arctic Seabed

MILESTONES: ARCTIC   By Paula L. Green   The Danish government is embarking on a precarious high-wire act as it presents an Arctic seabed claim to the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf.   Danish Arctic claims clash with ...

Country Report: Spain

UPHILL BATTLE   By Antonio Guerrero   Spanish banks are struggling to regain momentum in the face of a sluggish economy and the need for further restructuring.   Three years after Spain’s decade-long real estate bubble burst, the country’s banks ...