For firms active in European capital markets, the second half of this year is going to look very different to the first. Even as recently as March, many finance professionals were predicting the possibility of a bumper year across a raft of asset classes. M&A activity was still spurring on financing needs across the continent, and apart from the occasional dip, markets were generally holding up. First quarter results had been rosy at most of the bulge-bracket banks and many of the smaller pl

The hangover from the Russian banking crisis of 1998 saw many international banks pull back from Russia entirely. But the growth in activity over recent years has been such that all investment banks have gradually returned over the past five years. That has boosted competition, but has also driven the market on and triggered further growth. At the same time the investor universe has come to view Russia as a key emerging market. It is of course part of the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) g

Italy is frequently in the middle of a banking crisis, or just recovering from one. The sector is still bouncing back from last year's chaos surrounding the takeover of Antonveneta by Dutch bank ABN AMRO, and the resulting investigation had a knock-on impact on the whole industry, including the Bank of Italy. Against that backdrop, and the fact that the two biggest investment banking groups are the result of a flurry of mergers and takeovers that are still being properly integrated, it is remark

Spanish capital markets activity is relatively muted for such a large country, and unsurprisingly BBVA and Santander are driven by their retail banking franchises. Although the largest of Spanish firms (particularly in former state-owned giants in the utility sectors) have been active users of domestic and international capital markets, the remainder of the economy is very fragmented, with even old companies frequently still in the hands of the founding family and uninterested in spreading much

The Nordic region is one of the few markets in Europe where the local firms remain dominant with all but the largest companies. For some, then, the challenge is how to grow much more. That inevitably involves making forays outside the home territory, where they come up against stiff competition. Nevertheless, the sector as a whole has performed very strongly, and a clear trend has been the emergence of the Icelandic banks on the regional scene. Firms like Carnegie and Nordea risk seeing their ma

The Benelux banking landscape has been dominated by one event this year – the battle for ABN AMRO. While the independent future of the bank has been questioned for many years, it was not until early in 2007 that a concrete move was made for the bank, with Barclays announcing an all-stock bid that also involved a sale of ABN's US operations, LaSalle Bank, to Bank of America. Shortly after, a rival bid comprising mostly cash was announced by a consortium of the UK's RBS, Santander of Spain and Bel

It has unquestionably been one of UBS's worst years from a publicity perspective. The embarrassment of having to shut down its hedge fund joint venture Dillon Read Capital Management was made worse not only by the one-off charge of SFr384m (US$323m) that it had to absorb as a result, but also by the fallout in personnel that followed – not least the ousting of chief executive Peter Wuffli. Its financial performance was far from outstanding, and considerably less impressive than at Credit Suisse,

Deutsche Bank, which topped the euro bond tables in the first half of this year, is continuing to be the bank against which many others in European capital markets benchmark themselves. In the first half of the year, it posted pre-tax profits in its corporate and investment bank up 18% to €4.4bn, on revenues up 23% at €12.7bn. So diversified is its business now that rivals struggle to describe it as a German bank. It also topped the corporate, investment-grade, agency, municipal, supranational a

The French capital markets arena is dominated by Societe Generale and BNP Paribas, both houses that are driven by their well established derivative and euro fixed income businesses. But with BNPP integrating BNL of Italy, Natixis still working to consolidate the merger of Natexis and IXIS, and the merger of Credit Lyonnais and Credit Agricole only a few years old, SG stands out as the bank among the leading pack that has been almost entirely focused on organic growth. That could all change, howe

British banks are not the first to come to mind when looking at the capital markets and investment banking industry. In spite of London's status as the world's dominant international financing centre, there are no longer any major British-owned pure-play investment banks, now that venerable names such as SG Warburg have passed into foreign hands and the annals of history. However, judging by the contribution that investment banking now makes to the financial performance of UK institutions such a