At a recent Washington, DC forum, multilateral development banks (MDBs) agreed they should expand emerging market private sector investment in addition to lending to governments for major infrastructure projects. This, they agreed, needs a coherent and standardised approach, as Jane Monahan reports.
A US regulatory overhaul has been welcomed by many who believe Dodd-Frank has spawned too many regulations and prevents smaller banks from lending. However, there are concerns that the replacement Financial Choice Act will sweep away many of the safeguards designed to prevent a repeat of the 2008 crisis. Jane Monahan reports.
World Bank president Jim Yong Kim speaks to Jane Monahan about the institution's changing approach to investing in infrastructure in developing economies, its national disaster emergency response, and how it is getting more involved in the renewable energy market.
With the US as its top export market and substantial exposure to oil prices, Mexico is precariously placed if the US recovery stalls or the oil price remains low. Despite this, the country’s largest banks are well capitalised and remain optimistic for the future, as Jane Monahan reports.
With tax evasion, money laundering and finances for terrorism often concealed in offshore shell companies, the US is introducing rules to shine a light on the owners of these anonymous companies. But the government will not have an easy ride in bringing in the changes across all states, writes Jane Monahan.
Bolivia’s varied and largely healthy banking system faces challenges from new legislation that sets lending rates and deposit floors. While bigger banks see opportunities in social housing loans, the rate curbs could have implications for microfinance lenders, and consequently for poorer citizens. Jane Monahan reports.
The first-quarter results of the US's largest banks exemplifies the difficulties being felt in the fixed-income, currencies and commodities trading space. However, unlike some of their European counterparts, US lenders are not pulling out of the business entirely. Jane Monahan investigates why.
The IMF's quota system – which heavily favours the G7 countries – has long been deemed outdated by the BRICS countries, among others. But with any hope of immediate reform being held up in US Congress, and alternative institutions being established, the IMF's battle to remain globally relevant is under threat.
Growth in Puerto Rico's economy is sluggish, and its banks have been struggling to find profitable areas. However, a round of mergers and acquisitions – some of them enforced – and opportunities overseas mean that the island's lenders are finding some ways to expand.
Private banking and wealth management can be hugely lucrative, bringing in fees and boosting profits in a way that other areas of banking struggle to match. However, increased regulatory pressures and the emergence of newer, cheaper online competitors are shifting the landscape of the market. Jane Monahan examines an industry at a crossroads.
The funding of infrastructure projects by institutional investors is a topic being hotly debated right now. While the hurdles for institutional parties looking at such opportunities are many, there is a growing feeling that in such a low-interest-rate environment, their potentially high yields make them worth the risk and effort.
Ecuador is striving to re-establish ties with the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, tap international capital markets and embrace orthodox economic policies. However, when it comes to banking, the country's new direction is not proving to be universally popular.
New regulatory pressures and slow economic growth have been taking their toll on the US's small regional lenders, leading to worries that many of them will be squeezed out of the market. But results from the first quarter of 2014 show that these smaller players are actually performing better than the country's larger lenders.
Since their federal takeover in 2008, the fate of US mortgage underwriters Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac has hung in the balance. Politicians have jostled back and forth on the issue of winding them down, but without any workable and politically agreeable way to fill the void they would leave in the US housing market, it seems that the two institutions may be here to stay.