Is the African renaissance for real? Or will development hopes again be dashed? Nigerian president Umaru Musa Yar’Adua makes the positive case.

Brian Caplen takes the temperature of the banking community at the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos – and finds few optimists among the frowns.

Geraldine Lambe examines how banking’s big hitters have coped during the subprime crisis.

BMI assesses the ramifications if China’s growth slows, and Deutsche Bank identifies a funding gap in microfinance.

Any hopes of Q4 results helping to restore the battered fortunes of the top five US banks were dashed as a further wave of bad news from the economy and escalating fall-out from the subprime crisis hit confidence.

The glut of subprime crisis-related lawsuits lodged in the US may have implications for the UK, say Tim Strong and Ivan Wilkinson.

With $100-a-barrel oil creating abundant wealth in the Gulf, the spending power of governments, state-owned entities and private companies is changing the dynamic of the investment world, writes Nadine Marroushi.

With a thriving economy that appears to be on the up, Panama is seeing a wave of takeovers by foreign banks. John Rumsey reports.

Xiao Gang, chairman of Bank of China, talks to Stephen Timewell about the bank’s domestic and international strategy for the coming year.

Banks’ overall downturn in performance, despite Japan’s economic growth, signals a rough road ahead.