Latest articles from World

Boom time for CEE banking

October 3, 2005

Hungary’s OTP tops the list as central European banks enjoy good times and foreign players join the party.

Criticism of foreign ownership grows

October 3, 2005

Economic stability has brought foreign banks streaming into Turkey to buy or partner its own banks, causing some locals to question the trend. Michael Kuser reports from Istanbul.

EU negotiations could be tough

October 3, 2005

Turkey is bracing itself for gruelling EU membership talks.Metin Demirsar reports on the state of its economy and the steps that the government must take to meet the union’s requirements.

Buoyancy in a weak economy

October 3, 2005

Banks are displaying considerable resilience, with their profits growing, in an economy that is climbing out of recession.By Peter Wise.
Portuguese banks are nothing if not resilient. This will be the fifth year in which the economy has underperformed average EU growth. Recovery since a deep recession in 2003, when GDP growth contracted by 1.1%, has been weak and the outlook for the coming two years is less than buoyant.

Foreign shores provide growth

October 3, 2005

Stephen Timewell reports from Reykjavik on Iceland’s rapid transformation into a pan-European banking force. Iceland is a truly amazing country. And it is not just the volcanoes, the geo-thermal springs or even singer Bjork that make it unique.
Iceland boasts a banking sector that almost doubled in asset size last year, an economy that grew at 5.2% in 2004 and an expected 6.6% this year and a GDP per capita amongst the highest in the world at $40,250 in 2004.

The bank that changed its spots

October 3, 2005

Alliance & Leicester is run by a chief executive with retailing in his blood. But he is repositioning it as a niche commercial player, as Michael Imeson reports.
A leopard cannot change its spots but a bank can change its make-up. Alliance & Leicester (A&L), Britain’s seventh largest bank and a former building society, is primarily a retail bank but is gradually developing its wholesale banking business.

UK cultivates property derivatives market

October 3, 2005

Many believe that property-linked instruments are poised to become the next big thing in the derivatives market – but they are not sure when. In the first of two articles, The Banker looks at how the market is likely to evolve.Natasha de Teran reports.
Concerns about overheating in the UK property market have been as widespread over the past few years as they ever have been, with many fearing the worst from the record rise in asset prices.

New Riches- How China and the GCC will spend their megabucks

October 3, 2005

Bankers are already on the case of how China’s and the Gulf States’ huge reserves of foreign exchange can be put to best use.Stephen Timewell reports.

Top 1000 2023

The Banker on Twitter