It is now 18 months before Solvency II, the new solvency regime for European insurers and reinsurers, is due to come into force. Insurers have been preparing for a long time, in some instances many years, to implement the regime which will come into effect on 1 January 2013 and which will have far-reaching consequences…
Chinese iron ore trading developer Sinosteel Midwest suspended work on its $2.1bn Australia-based Weld Range iron ore mining project due to uncertainty surrounding the proposed Oakajee port and rail project. The $5.2bn joint venture between Mitsubishi and Murchison Metals has been inundated by delays recently and Sinosteel, one of the largest investors by a Chinese…
First Bank of Nigeria Plc (FirstBank), established in 1894, is a premier bank in West Africa and the leading financial services solutions provider in Nigeria. The bank was founded by Sir Alfred Jones, a shipping magnate from Liverpool, UK. With its head office originally in Liverpool, the bank commenced business on a modest scale in…
Trading dynamics have changed radically in the last decade. Investors used to wait months or years for investment prospects. Today, technology allows traders and investors to seize opportunities instantly and manage risks directly. The $4trn daily foreign exchange market offers what other markets failed to attain, and is now easily accessible and affordable for everyone….
From a humble beginning as a trading house in 1977, Al-Tuwairqi Holding Company (ATH) is now one of the leading businesses in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The company has shown a phenomenal growth over the last two decades and today is among the top five private sector industrial concerns in the Kingdom. Dr Hilal…
The board of directors are elected by the owners of a company to act on their behalf; and while taking care of their interests they are also bound by regulation aiming at policyholder protection. There are a number of different board decisions to be made, ranging from recruiting the executive team to setting the business…
Could you give us an idea of KBL European Private Bankers’ [epb] strategy?Since the 1980s, KBL epb has devoted its strategy to private banking and a pan-European onshore presence has been built up by putting the emphasis on well-known local private banking brands. Thanks to organic growth and successive acquisitions we have now become the…
Michael Kyprianou & Co LLC is a broad based legal practice based in Cyprus and Greece. One of its areas of specialisation is the company formation, management and administration of Cyprus and offshore companies, and formation and administration of Trusts. Cyprus business lawA Cyprus company needs to have at least one director, one shareholder, one…
A golden rule in management indicates that changes should ideally take place before problems emerge, anticipating them and ensuring a timely response, thus enhancing effectiveness. In order to do so, changes need to be thought and discussed when the existing environment is still functioning correctly. This is exactly how Solvency II was designed. It is…
Up until now, Wealth and Investment Management (WIM) has been a fairly stable business in all the key areas such as market evolution, client behaviour, investment performance, competition, regulation and technological innovation. However, a series of different factors are reshaping this industry. Firstly, demography and wealth distribution are changing. As the over-64 world population holds…
