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Jaime de la Torre Viscasillas Law 9/2012 on the restructuring and resolution of credit entities was approved on November 14 2012. The law was approved based on Royal Decree-Law 24/2012, on the restructuring and resolution of credit entities, which implemented commitments of the Spanish government assumed in its Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) agreed with the international authorities on July 20 2011. The MOU established, among others, that real estate-related assets of banks that require state aid must be transferred to an asset management company. For this purpose, in December 2012, an asset management company named Sociedad de Gestión de Activos Procedentes de la Reestructuración Bancaria (AMC or Sareb) was incorporated. The AMC, through the Fund for Orderly Bank Restructuring (FROB), had a public participation lower than 50%. The purpose of this company is the tenancy, management, acquisition and transfer of so-called troubled assets. It is also authorised to issue obligations or other debt instruments (with no limits on the amounts).

Regulators in the Asia-Pacific have called for closer jurisdictional cooperation to protect emerging markets from onerous extraterritorial regulations.

US banks should brace themselves for stronger competition enforcement throughout President Obama's second term, a former Department of Justice (DoJ) antitrust official has warned.

What awaits hybrid bond investors in 2014

Some key developments for sukuk finance in 2012 have set the stage for the year ahead

Prospects for Brazilian deal activity are strong. But government roadblocks remain a cause for concern

The law on the Regulation of Fiduciaries, Administration Businesses and Company Directors, which transposes the provisions of Directive 2005/60/EC into national law, has been enacted by the Parliament of Cyprus. It applies to persons and companies providing relevant fiduciary and other corporate services relating to the administration or management of trusts and companies in or from Cyprus, including directorship and secretarial services provided by a legal person, services such as holding shares in a nominee or trustee capacity, provision of a registered office, services related to opening and operating bank accounts and the ownership of financial assets on behalf of third parties.

Patricia Aracely Solórzano Flores The use of ATMs (automatic teller machines) has become an important part of our lives; their popularity relies on the fact that they allow card holders to have quick and easy access to cash whenever they need it, thus avoiding the risk of getting robbed or losing money. However, due to technological advances, the security provided by ATMs is becoming outdated. Yet the use of security measures to protect users from being victims of crime is compulsory. Based on this necessity, and on the increasing number of complaints received at the Financial User Protection Office from ATM users, on December 6 2012 the Honduran Banking and Insurances National Commission issued the Safety Standards for Operating ATMs (Safety Standards). This represents the general trend of financial regulation in Honduras, where the user has become the central figure. Before the Safety Standards, card issuers were only required to implement proper measures to identify the card holder, but there were no rules regulating physical safety at ATMs. Today, according to the Safety Standards, ATM owners must comply with security guidelines, such as (i) employ mechanisms that guarantee the privacy of the transactions made in them, so that the information used is not available to third parties; (ii) take appropriate security measures in the places where ATMs are installed; video cameras must have good resolution for recording and storing images and movements of the events that occur at ATMs, and should allow the identification of the ATM user; (iii) external ATMs must be installed in an enclosure, the access door must have an internal mechanical locking device, to prevent third party access into the enclosure when the client or user is using the ATM, or if it is not in an enclosure then it must have physical security (a security guard) during public opening hours, or when the use of the ATM requires so.

With many hailing contingent convertible securities (CoCos) as the capital instrument of the future, issuers and investors are comparing the 2009 inaugural issuances and today's deals, to understand how the market will develop.

Freddy Karyadi Oene Marseille Bank Indonesia (BI) has recently issued the new Regulation number 14/24/PBI/2012 (the Regulation) to update its previous regulation, BI Regulation number 8/16/PBI/2006 (the 2006 Regulation) on single ownership of Indonesian banks. It came into effect on December 26 2012. The issuance of the Regulation revokes: the provisions in the 2006 Regulation; and the provisions in Article 2 paragraph 2a and e, Article 3, and Article 7 of BI Regulation number 8/17/PBI 2006 regarding incentives for the purposes of banking consolidation as amended by BI Regulation number 9/12/PBI/2007. The regulation aims to improve the competitiveness of the Indonesian banking system both on regional and global levels of economic development, by reducing the number of Indonesian banks via consolidation. This policy is also commonly known as the single presence policy, which is applicable to the banks' controlling shareholders that either hold at least 25% shares and have voting rights or have a direct or indirect control of the bank even with less than 25% of the shares.