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Anglo-Dutch multinational Unilever is selling its four chemicals businesses to ICI, the UK's largest chemicals company, for £4.9 billion (US$7.9 billion). The companies to be sold are National Starch, which makes industrial adhesives and starches, Quest, a manufacturer of food flavours and fragrances, Unichema, which turns natural fats into chemicals and Crosfield, which specializes in detergent ingredients.

Dr Leopold Pfaffel, head of the legal department at Bank Austria, talks to Graham Field

Boutique financial services firm MW Cornish & Co will join Arnheim & Co, big six accountant Price Waterhouse's UK law firm, on July 1. Senior partner Martin Cornish becomes head of the Price Waterhouse European legal financial services practice. MW Cornish claims a range of expertise in banking, corporate and corporate finance work, but Arnheim & Co emphasizes the firm's expertise in fund management work. David Newton, Price Waterhouse partner responsible for investment management, says: "The addition of legal expertise is an important step in the development of our Investment Management business. Our ambition is simple: to be recognized as the leading professional advisers to the funds management industry worldwide."

Coudert Brothers in Moscow has added six lawyers, including one poached from French firm Gide Loyrette Nouel. Hugues de Pommereau was at Gide in Moscow for 2 years. He will work on direct investment into Russia by French clients. Bruce Bean, managing partner of the office, says: "Around 10% of our business is for French-speaking companies, and although we have lawyers fluent in French here, Hugues is the first Frenchman." Also joining the firm as associates are: Christian Moore, James Christiansen, Pavel Bakoulev, Igor Marmalidi and Jennifer Brenner. The appointments bring the total number of lawyers in the office to 16. "Business is up tremendously since last November," says Bean. "Last year the Russian equity markets left the Dow in the dust, and this year they are doing it again. Investors have got over their shyness." Bean expects to expand to 30 lawyers by the end of the year.

Dallas-based Akin, Gump, Strauss, Hauer & Feld, LLP opened an office in London at the end of April. At the moment staffed by four lawyers, including former Linklaters & Paines senior partner John Edwards, the office will concentrate on capital markets work. According to office managing partner Keith Hughes, this is not a new development for the firm. "We were already here, we are only adding the office to complement our existing presence. We have been doing capital markets transactions in London for several years now," he says.

The Danish Act on UCITS is being revised in a proposal tabled in April and which also includes the possibility of establishing 'NON-UCITS' in Denmark.

A new law at last offers insolvent Peruvian companies a better chance of avoiding liquidation. By Ismael Noya De La Piedra and Augusto Cauti Barrantes of Estudio Luis Echecopar García, Lima

Competition between the offshore centres is increasing, especially in the Caribbean. Most are very keen to prove their credentials against money-laundering and cut the risk of scandals. Clare Hepburn reports

The Cyprus Stock Exchange (CSE) is preparing the market for a 'big bang' by implementing a major deregulation which will free the fixed trading brokerage commissions and allow stockbrokers to offer and set their fees according to supply and demand. The shake-up could be implemented by July 1997, two years after Cyprus Stock Exchange Law was passed. At present, investors pay a 1% brokerage commission when buying securities, plus 0.15% stamp duty levied by the government, and a further 1% brokerage commission when selling their positions. The fee paid by the brokers to the CSE was most recently reduced to 1 per thousand or 10% of the amount the brokers collect from investors for both inside and outside transactions.

The piecemeal reforms of US banking regulations do open genuine opportunities to foreign banks. Connie M Friesen and David Nissenbaum of Richards & O’Neil, LLP, New York, explain