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Jane Sim Serene Sia Through a press release on October 3 2012, Singapore's Ministry of Finance (MOF) confirmed that it has completed its review of the Companies Act. Following the public consultation carried out in 2011, the MOF has accepted 192 and modified 17 recommendations of the Steering Committee. This is the largest number of changes to the Act since it was enacted in 1967. The wide ranging changes are aimed at maintaining Singapore's competitiveness as a business hub, reduce regulatory burden and compliance costs for companies, provide greater flexibility for companies, and to improve the country's corporate governance landscape. Most importantly, it will bring benefits to various stakeholder groups such as companies, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), retail investors and company directors. Following are some of the noteworthy changes:

Mian Muhammad Nazir The Emirates Bankers Association has set up an Islamic Banking Committee (IBC) to review various shariah governance models at the regulator's level and to propose a suitable model for the Central Bank of UAE to implement. The IBC is assessing the merits and demerits of different models practised in other countries. The IBC is mandated to suggest a shariah governance structure at the Central Bank which will provide the regulatory support to Islamic financial institutions (including Islamic windows) through setting up an Islamic banking department at the Central Bank of UAE. Most likely the shariah governance structure at the Central Bank will essentially follow an improved form of any of the existing models. This involves, among other things, establishing a shariah supervisory board at the Central Bank to oversee the overall regulation of the Islamic financial institutions. In proposing a suitable governance structure, particularly recommending a shariah supervisory board at the Central Bank, the Emirates Bankers Association would certainly be endeavouring to reconcile the mandatory provisions of Federal Law No 6 of 1985 and the precedents of having a shariah supervisory board at the central banks.

Jaime de la Torre Viscasillas On August 31 2012, the Spanish government approved Royal Decree-Law 24/2012 on the restructuring and resolution of credit entities, which implements its commitments assumed in the Memorandum of Understanding agreed with Eurogroup on July 2011 and the proposal for a Directive establishing a framework for the recovery and resolution of credit institutions and investment firms that is being discussed at the EU Parliament. Within the next three months, the Fund for Orderly Bank Restructuring (FROB) will incorporate an asset management company named Sociedad de Gestión de Activos Procedentes de la Reestructuración Bancaria, which will be owned by the FROB, and financial entities (public participation must be less than 50%). The purpose of this company will be the tenancy, management, acquisition and transfer of troubled assets, and it will be authorised to issue obligations or other debt instruments (with no limits on the amounts).

Continuing its efforts to promote transparency, Vietnam's Ministry of Finance issued Circular No 52/2012/TT-BTC on April 5 2012, guiding the disclosure of information on the securities market (Circular 52). This came into effect from June 1 2012, replacing Circular No 09/2010/TT-BTC (Circular 09). In addition to Circular 52, the State Securities Commission (SSC) promulgated Decision No 515/QD-UBCK dated June 25 2012 enabling the disclosure of information on the SSC website (Decision 515).

Other countries are tipped to follow the UK Financial Services Authority's (FSA) lead and soften bank capital requirements ahead of Basel III implementation.

The Ryanair/Aer Lingus deal reveals a shortfall in EU merger control regarding minority shareholdings. But is reform appropriate?

What do you get if you ask three economists to devise the future shape of the banking industry? It sounds like the beginning of a good joke doesn't it? Except, I can't quite think of the punch line.

The chair of the securities lending and repo workstream of the Financial Stability Board’s (FSB’s) shadow banking taskforce has laid out the policy options his team is reviewing, giving a real indication of what form the proposals will take

Zambia has become the latest Sub-Saharan sovereign to tap the international capital markets, issuing its inaugural sovereign bond.

Shearman & Sterling's Financial Institutions Advisory and Financial Regulatory group head, Barnabas Reynolds, outlines why the entire regulatory effort to tackle shadow banking could be one step too far