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EU and country-level reforms aimed at fighting Spain’s debt crisis have proved an unlikely source of new transactions

Hong Kong’s securities regulator is cracking down on sponsor due diligence. But there may be a fine line between protecting investors and damaging the city’s competitiveness

Bilateral investment treaties could be the weapon of choice for foreign investors holding Greek sovereign bonds

How a recent initiative by the Covered Bond Investor Council is helping Europe make informed investment decisions

Regulators across the Asia-Pacific are preparing to implement rules for clearing OTC derivatives transactions. But many jurisdictions are stumbling on legal issues

Gustavo Vega Arrazola Savings and Credit Entities (SCEs) are regulated financial institutions of private capital authorised to develop credit and lending activities. In El Salvador, the operation of SCEs is governed by the Law of Cooperative Banks and Savings and Credit Entities, which came into force on July 1 2001, and was amended in January 1 2009 to its current regime. SCEs are monitored by the Superintendency of the Financial System. As regulated financial institutions, SCEs are subject to many Banking Law provisions. SCEs can be authorised to accept deposits from the public; nevertheless they can operate as SCEs without the authorisation to accept deposits, just developing lending and credit activities.

Among the various measures taken by the Brazilian government to stimulate investments in infrastructure and research and development projects, one of them refers to issuance of debt securities to raise funds for such investments, which may be issued as debentures or any other type of securities admitted in Brazilian legislation (Capex Debentures).

Daniel Futej Daniel Grigel An amendment to the Slovak Insolvency Code came into effect on January 1 2012 though important provisions newly regulating the responsibility of statutory bodies and other persons will not become effective until January 1 2013. The key legislative changes concern the test of over-indebtedness and the liability of the directors of insolvent companies There are two insolvency tests: financial liquidity test (the ability of the company to comply with its due debts) and test of over-indebtedness (the ratio of the company's total assets to its total debts – until the amendment it related to overdue debts). The over-indebtedness test will be assessed taking into consideration the debtor's future (expected) economic results. Subordinated and similar debts will be excluded from calculation of a debtor's financial situation. In both instances, for a company to become insolvent it is required to prove that it has more than one creditor – in the case of the financial liquidity test, with more than 30 days overdue debts.

The Central Bank of Cyprus has announced that it has commissioned an independent review of the domestic banking system at the request of the so-called troika (the tripartite committee of the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund that is coordinating assistance under EU support mechanisms). The exercise will cover the principal commercial banks as well as the Co-operative Central Bank and a representative sample of affiliated cooperative credit institutions. It will include an asset quality review and a bottom-up stress test aimed at determining the capital needs of each participating institution.

Iskandar Malaysia is the southern development corridor in Johor, Malaysia. It was officially launched in November 2006 and covers 221,634 hectares of land area within the southern-most part of Johor. The development region encompasses an area of about three-times the size of Singapore and two-times the size of Hong Kong, and has been identified as one of the catalyst developments to spur the growth of the Malaysian economy.