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New York's niche aviation, maritime and transport-related asset finance firm Haight, Gardner, Poor & Havens has agreed to a merger offer from Miami-based general practice firm Holland & Knight. "In the globalizing market you can no longer sit back and say we're Haight Gardner, we're the best in aviation, shipping and asset finance. That's not enough any more," explains Brian Starer, chairman of the firm. "The client base needs broader-based services. We found more and more over the last few years that we had to pass on business such as IPOs to other firms," he continues. "We decided that when we were approached by a firm with a whole shopping cart full of services we should jump into their basket."

Greater transparency is being recognized as the key to identifying the trail of illicit funds in South America. By Rodolfo Gerardo Papa of Cárdenas, Cassagne & Asociados, Buenos Aires

The Amsterdam Treaty, to be signed in October, makes significant reforms but failed to answer the main questions of how to reach decisions in an enlarged EU. By Raymond O’ Rourke of Stanbrook and Hooper, Brussels

• Serge Durox, former head of the legal department of BNP Capital Markets, is joining New York-based Coudert Brothers as a partner. Now based in London, Durox says he will work closely with the Paris, London, Moscow and New York offices, with particular involvement in the practices the London and Paris offices are building jointly. Jacques Buhart, managing partner of Coudert Frères, the firm's Paris office, says Durox "will be involved in developing the firm's derivatives practice in France".

A recent case underlines the reluctance of UK courts to impose personal duties on directors of companies where there is economic loss but not personal injury. By David Kavanagh of Watson, Farley & Williams, London

The Hungarian parliament will shortly consider major company law reforms, setting more stringent financial criteria and modernizing other corporate requirements. By Zoltán Grmela of Gárdos, Benke, Mosonyi, Tomori, Budapest

Private sector finance is increasing in France. But undertaking projects with local government will require foreign companies to bridge a cultural gap. By Jacques Bertran de Balanda and Gilles Heude of Clifford Chance, Paris

By the end of fiscal 2000, a momentous series of reforms should have opened the Japanese financial markets. The government’s programme is reviewed by Naoaki Eguchi, Yasushi Murofushi and Jeremy Pitts of Tokyo Aoyama Law Office-Baker & McKenzie, Tokyo

On July 1 1997, the EU made a fresh offer to the World Trade Organization (WTO) in the course of the current talks aimed at liberalizing financial services worldwide. The new offer increases the scope of the previous offer, which included, among other things, free access (on a most-favoured-nation basis) for foreign institutions to the EU's internal market in financial services, and the right to establish branches.

A recent case in New South Wales seems to have resolved the doubts surrounding the creation of fixed charges over receivables raised by Royal Trust Bank. By John Stumbles and Scott Farrell of Mallesons Stephen Jaques, Sydney