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Recommended firms Tier 1 Allen & Overy Clifford Chance De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek Tier 2 Linklaters NautaDutilh Stibbe The Netherlands has seen substantial growth in two particular areas in 2006, one on the debt side and one in equity. Firstly, high yield corporate bonds have doubled in deal value. The first nine months of the year saw $3.66 billion-worth of activity across eight deals. During the same period of 2005, a mere three deals totalled $1.8 billion. Despite the fact that the average deal value has fallen by a third, the market should be pleased that there are more deals, resulting in more money to be made.

The statistics for the German equity market in 2006 make happy reading for law firms handling equity brokerage in Europe's largest economy. While the overall value of initial public offering (IPO) deals nearly doubled from $3.3 billion in the first nine months of 2005 to $6 billion in the first nine months of 2006, the really impressive jump was in the sheer volume of transactions. The $3.3 billion was generated by just 12 IPOs while the number of deals in 2006 soared to 51.

How firms are reacting to the stampede of equity to Europe

Investors need to consider their intentions in Chinese banks

Need for SEC relief

Earlier this year, the United Arab Emirates ratified its accession to the Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards 1958, more commonly known as the New York Convention. After the recent satisfaction of certain procedural requirements, the Convention will obtain force of law in the UAE from November 19 2006. By ratifying the Convention, the UAE joined its GCC neighbours Oman, Bahrain, Qatar and Saudi Arabia, where the Convention already enjoys force of law.

A new Mortgage Law became effective on February 25 2006 in Serbia, replacing the old Law on Basic Property Relations. The basic concept of what constitutes a mortgage has remained the same, but the new Mortgage Law has introduced some welcome innovations as to how and when a mortgage can be established over real property in Serbia, and has also introduced new forms of mortgageable property (that is, interests in property).

The pace of the public market's growth in Argentina has been markedly restrained in recent years, to the point where the Argentine stock market is not regarded as a liquid market. During 2006, the Merval (the local index on domestic share returns) has registered a negative return on US dollars, while the Bovespa (one of Brazil's indexes, used as Latin America's benchmark) registered, for the same period, a 35% return on US dollars.

Like many of its richest and most glamorous citizens, Russia's bigger companies continue to be attracted to foreign markets. Of the five largest IPOs by Russian issuers in the first nine months of 2006, three were dual listed in Moscow and London and another listed solely on Nasdaq. Similarly, English and US firms tend to dominate both local and international legal advice although one local firm, Liniya Prava, is making a name for itself for both debt and equity.

Recommended firms Tier 1 Allen & Overy Baker & McKenzie Grszczynski I Wspolnicy Attorneys at Law Weil Gotshal & Manges Tier 2 Clifford Chance Janicka Namiotkiewicz i wspolnicy spolka komandytowa Dewey Ballantine Grzesiak Linklaters White & Case W Danilowicz W Jurcewicz I Wspolnicy There has been little cheer in the Polish capital markets this year. Although inflation has been brought under control, the country continues to face stiff economic challenges and its markets have reflected that with a dearth of new offerings.