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Bank Austria Creditanstalt AG recently acquired shares in Nova Banjalucka Banka ad, Banja Luka, creating the first concentration in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) ever to be cleared by the new competent authority, the Competition Council. The transaction highlighted some important procedural provisions to be aware of when submitting a filing for a transaction in BiH under the new Competition Law (Zakon o konkurenciji), which took effect on July 27 2005.

The SEC's plans to revive the tender offer as a viable alternative to the one-step merger may need refining. Ben Maiden reports

A recent aircraft deal was the first to use a group of monoline insurers to wrap a single class of notes. By Ben Maiden

Mary Schapiro, NASD NASD, the world's largest private sector securities regulator, announced that Mary Schapiro is to succeed Robert Glauber as chairman and chief executive of the organization. She was previously head of NASD's regulatory policy and oversight division. In that role she served as the chief regulator for more than 5,000 securities brokerages firms and almost 700,000 registered brokers. Before joining NASD, Schapiro chaired the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and was an SEC commissioner.

John France, Ashurst Ashurst appointed five partners in London, Frankfurt and Milan. David von Saucken and Matt McDonald joined the restructuring and insolvency group in the firm's London office, while Ingo Scholz was hired to the Frankfurt office, also in the restructuring and insolvency group. Energy, transport and infrastructure specialist Franco Vigliano and international finance partner John France joined Ashurst in Milan. McDonald, von Saucken and Scholz were previously partners at Haarmann Hemmelrath, where they advised on non-performing loan portfolio acquisitions and restructuring. Vigliano and France were both project finance specialists at Allen & Overy in Milan.

Espirito Santo Financial Group completed a Lehman Brothers-managed £500 million ($880 million) debt security issue. Linklaters, led by partner Keith Thompson, acted for Lehman on the fixed-rate note issue with warrants. The deal represents the first listing of notes with warrants since the implementation of the Prospectus Directive and the first issue of bonds with warrants by a European issuer since 2001. Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer represented Espirito Santo Financial Group on the deal.

A recent decision by the High Court of England and Wales has further strengthened the position of creditors seeking to recover moneys owed by defaulting sovereign debtors. In Kensington International Limited v Republic of the Congo [2005] EWHC 2684 (Comm), the Court held that private creditors of the Republic of Congo could enforce their judgments in England against assets of numerous entities that it held to be emanations of the Congolese state.

Hong Kong's first real estate investment trust backed by Chinese assets required tough negotiations over foreign exchange, tax, corporate and land title issues. By Raymond Li and Vivian Lam

Texan firms Andrews Kurth and Vinson & Elkins advised on the first US initial public offering (IPO) of 2006, for Linn Energy. The natural gas exploration and production company raised almost $250 million through its flotation on Nasdaq. In Houston, James Baird and Gislar Donnenberg of Andrews Kurth advised the company. Thomas Mason of Vinson & Elkins acted for the lead underwriters, Lehman Brothers and RBS Capital Markets.

Herbert Smith announced the establishment of a dispute resolution practice in mainland China. The team will be led by litigation partner Graeme Johnson from Shanghai, working alongside the firm's corporate departments in Shanghai and Beijing as well as the dispute resolution practice in Hong Kong.