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On April 16 the Czech government announced a package of measures to cut growing budget and trade deficits, stimulate the sluggish economy, dampen demand for imports and add confidence to the Czech capital markets. The package consists of monetary and fiscal measures, policies on privatization and capital markets and the protection of the domestic market, and measures aimed at tackling white collar crime.

The Supreme Court has been working with the Singapore Academy of Law to promote the resolution of disputes by way of mediation. Cases considered suitable for mediation have been identified by the Supreme Court and, with the parties' consent, referred to the Commercial Mediation Service of the Singapore Academy of Law. The promotion of the use of mediation is another extension of the judiciary's efforts to encourage litigants to settle their disputes amicably.

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."

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

Grand Metropolitan and Guinness are merging to form GMG Brands, the world's largest spirits and wine group. The group will be worth around £23.8 billion (US$38.6 billion), but the merger has been challenged by rival drinks companies who believe it is anti-competitive.

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

Bankers Trust, the US's seventh-largest bank, is to buy the country's oldest investment bank, Alex. Brown. The US$1.6 billion stock swap acquisition marks the latest erosion of the US's Glass-Steagall legislation separating commercial and investment banks.

‘Rogue’ traders are an inevitable price paid by the markets for their cultivation of immature and selfish behaviour. By Eric C Bettelheim of Mayer, Brown & Platt, London

Freshfields has announced the appointment of a second partner in its London US securities group and is set to complete its first US registered securities deal. Don Guiney joins the US securities group from Brobeck Hale and Dorr, the London operation of Boston firm Hale and Dorr and California's Brobeck Phleger & Harrison. "What I did for Brobeck Hale was to establish their joint venture office [in 1990] with a credible securities practice operating for both underwriters and issuers," explains Guiney. "But Freshfields offered the challenge and excitement of working to build a securities practice in the global market."