Dresdner Kleinwort is ahead of the advisory pack in terms of deal value in European electricity mergers and acquisitions this year. The bank’s utilities and natural resources team talk to Edward Russell-Walling about their recent success in one of the most difficult deals in cross-border history, Enel’s takeover of Endesa.

As the world enters a new era of diverse wealth distribution, global financial institutions must reflect the change.

The current debacle over Northern Rock is going to lead to a complete rethink on markets and the way they are governed.

With the subprime crisis in the US causing worldwide reverberations, we asked a group of leading economists to consider whether a soft or hard landing was in prospect. They also considered sovereign wealth funds, the renminbi and the roles of the IMF and World Bank.

Too little is made of the fact that financial market institutions have been underprepared to measure, manage and price high-impact risks; indeed decision makers are actively rewarded for underestimating risks associated with low-probability events. Nassim Nicholas Taleb (left)and George A Martin (right) explain.

Felipe Larraín assesses whether policies by certain Latin American populist governments could undermine present price stability and usher in a return of the high inflations of the 1980s.

In India, long-term value is being left on the table as environmental, social and governance issues are ignored. But these issues will be increasingly important competitive differentiators, writes Dan Siddy.

High standards of governance will be essential to convince local investors to participate in the regional financial centres that are springing up around the world. And London looks set to benefit from business with those centres as they adopt EU-style regulations, writes Brandon Davies.

On its 25th anniversary, the Institute of International Finance is well placed to facilitate a new world order involving the sharing of responsibility for global financial stability between multinational financial services firms and governmental institutions, say Dr Josef Ackermann (left) and Charles H Dallara (right).

Pakistan is implementing a new development paradigm for the country’s banking sector with the aim of bringing the country’s poor and rural population into the system, writes Dr Shamshad Akhtar.