Silvia Pavoni reports on the potential and pitfalls of private finance for the UK’s new nuclear power station building programme.

Islamic finance is growing fast in the Gulf region as banks look for new growth opportunities, but it is also making inroads into non-Muslim markets, writes Stephen Timewell.

So-called ‘frontier markets’ hold no fears for some investors. Edward Russell-Walling reports on how broker-cum-investment bank Exotix went digging for profits in the zinc mines of Yemen.

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

Infrastructure finance has formed an important part of the mergers and acquisitions (M&A) boom of recent years. According to Thomson Financial, the value of infrastructure-related deals exceeded $300bn globally both in 2006 and 2007. Despite these record levels of investment, there is no sign of the demand for infrastructure assets relenting as financial sponsors, notably specialist infrastructure funds, continue to drive the growth of the market.

Angola’s retail banking network, while at an early stage of development, is growing fast along with an oil-driven economy. Rodrigo Amaral reports.

A decade after big developers pulled back, sub-Saharan Africa is re-emerging as a market for infrastructure finance, with innovations in international and local markets, write Jon Marks and Kevin Godier.

MediCapital, the new sales and investment banking arm of BMCE, aims to spark interest in untapped African markets. Neil Sen reports.

It is time to start thinking about the next upturn. The credit crisis still has some while to run depending on how it seeps through the system and it seems likely that most parts of the world will be affected in some way or other.