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By Jana Hecker, Global Head of Equity Capital Markets, UniCredit

Sovcombank, one of Russia’s largest private banks, is making strides in its push to reshape Russia’s financial services marketplace. Dmitry Gusev, its chief executive, talks to GlobalCapital about the bank and its plans for 2021, ahead of a possible IPO.

If MREL is going to be an important line of defence for Europe’s banking system, market participants had better be able to see those defences. At the moment, they are hidden in mists.

The UK government is in the midst of a review that is seeking to make London a more attractive listing venue for high growth international technology companies. While change is undoubtedly concerning for some who do not want the UK to lose its reputation for high standards, the UK should not ignore a chance for the London Stock Exchange to evolve.

During last January’s conference in Vienna, we felt that sentiment around CEE was mostly optimistic, but — to be frank — slightly unenthusiastic. It seemed as though everybody was expecting another solid, but ordinary year ahead. The news about the novel coronavirus in China was very distant.

What size bonuses can investment bankers expect in the next few months? On the one hand, they have made oodles of dough for their firms. On the other, their employers face pressure not to be too generous while much of the rest of society is struggling, with regulators wanting them to focus capital resources on lending to the real economy.

This week in Keeping Tabs: the former governor of the Bank of England on value and values, The New Republic on law and value, reminiscing about the last crisis, and a pub snack en vogue.

In the final instalment of GlobalCapital Asia’s awards announcements, we reveal the best Asian investment bank and the best investment bank in the region for 2020, as well as the bank that stands out for its response to the Covid pandemic.

GlobalCapital and Standard Chartered hosted a combination of virtual and in-person roundtable on the China high yield debt market at the end of November. The third part of a 2020 series followed the first roundtable in April and the second in July. This time around, leading experts came together to discuss the opportunities and outlook for the Mainland’s high yield bond market.

Green bonds awakened the debt capital markets from their long, slumbrous ignorance of environmental peril.

Not content with the central bank purchase programmes of seemingly infinite elasticity, some Italian officials have recently floated the possibility of the ECB forgiving the debt it has purchased. This is illegal, and changing the law is not what Europe needs at the moment.

Can we just forget 2020 ever happened? Perhaps we should get our vaccines first. An entrepreneurial travel company is offering to help those of us at the back of the queue.