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Last week the market gathered for one of the biggest events of the year: the Loan Market Association conference, and this year’s event was all the more special for being the shindig's 20th anniversary. While many attendees were brimming with enthusiasm for the big day there were, as always, a few renegades lurking in the background.

Silk Road bonds are one of the latest gimmicks bankers are trying to promote with an event dedicated to the topic taking place in Hong Kong last week. While the concept of the bonds, linked directly to China’s ambitious Belt and Road initiative, is promising, proper guidelines need to be in place for the product to take off.

Much like the markets themselves, the bid for bankers seems to have roared to life in September, with newly abundant movement in the senior ranks. Much of it is internal, which will provide little comfort to the headhunters, but there’s some hiring action as well.

Emaciated volumes in the loan and Euro PP markets mean they must buddy up to offer borrowers the best of both worlds.

Emerging market economic growth managed to hang on to much of its momentum over August, according to the latest release of the IHS Markit Emerging Market Composite PMI index.

Going for meetings in Hong Kong is stressful enough, but as I recently learned, it is not just traffic that one has to watch out for.

GlobalCapital announces the results of its first full scale, standalone set of Sustainable and Responsible Capital Markets Awards.

The quota system under the RMB qualified foreign institutional investor (RQFII) scheme has undergone a total revamp, the Chinese regulators announced on September 5. While the rules represent a further harmonisation of RQFII and QFII schemes, market participants still see obstacles to Chinese assets entering global indices.

With another slew of mediocre investment banking results due, there’s a renewed round of calls for 'radical visions' and 'thinking outside the box'. But, while thinking the unthinkable has its merits, it’s the hard, detailed work inside the box that pays the bills.

There is a lot of talk about how the UK has brushed off Brexit, with a series of strong data releases coming thick and fast. But so much of the chatter refers to a “post-Brexit bounce” — an odd phrase, given that Brexit has neither happened nor begun to happen.

The recent decision by the Singapore Exchange’s listings committee to give the green light to dual-class shares has received the usual jibes, with some contending that the move is coming far too late. But this is the big change that market participants have been calling for — even if they don’t know it yet.

Clawback turns his focus to cornerstones. Once a useful tool for creating demand, the process has morphed into a kind of insurance policy for IPOs, writes Philippe Espinasse.