Panama – A Tax Friendly Environment for Foreign Investors

By Luis E. Ocando Bustamante, International Tax Partner of Ernst & Young, Panama, Central America, and Dominican Republic. The economic boom of Panama [1] has been accompanied by changes in its tax system, making Panama more attractive for foreign investors, especially for multinational

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Fruitful Relationships: Clearing and Settlement in Brazil

By Flavio Peppe As Brazil’s economy has grown so has its financial markets. The volume of equities traded on the main market, BM&F BOVESPA, has increased five-fold over the past five years, and the exchange’s derivatives platform was the world’s

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Frugality, Education, Infrastructure and Attitude Change is Needed in the West: We Should Not Rely on Keynesian Nostrums to Pull Us Through

By Jon Moynihan The West’s economic dilemma will not be solved until those countries have not just restructured their balance sheets, by significantly lowering expenditure, but have also significantly changed the mix of that expenditure. In the UK and the

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New ‘Pacific Alliance’ Upbeat and Seeking Competitive Advantages

Leaders of Pacific Alliance: Ollanta Humala, President of Peru; Juan Manuel Santos, President of Colombia; Sebastián Piñera, President of Chile; Felipe Calderón, President of Mexico.   The new bloc’s integration opens up significant opportunities for incremental economic development through increased

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Baker & McKenzie: Kazakhstani International and Domestic Securities Offerings

By Edward A. Bibko With its large natural resources and relatively transparent legal regime, Kazakhstan has long been a destination for international companies. In addition, its domestic companies have been attracting international capital for years.  Within the CIS, the country has

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UN Economic Commission for Africa: Domestic Resource Mobilization in Africa

By Emmanuel Nnadozie, Chief Economist and Director, Economic Development and NEPAD Division (UN Economic Commission for Africa) A major challenge facing African countries is how to mobilize adequate, stable and predictable domestic resources to finance priority programmes and projects of

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Kuala Lumpur: ‘The Next Big Thing’ in Asia-Pacific Business Circles

It is Asia’s best-kept secret: business insiders are shunning the cost and congestion of Asia’s mega-cities and plumping for Kuala Lumpur’s strengths: cost competitiveness, profit potential and a first-rate lifestyle – a combination unmatched anywhere else in Asia. InvestKL CEO

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World Bank Group’s PREM: Harnessing Trade Opportunities for Growth and Development

The pace of global trade integration over the past two decades has been extraordinary. Trade has been a key driver of global growth, convergence, and poverty reduction. During 1983–2010, global trade grew twice as fast as gross domestic product (GDP).

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“The Entrepreneur” – A Sense of Balance

By Mona Vyas From the moment of conception to the surrender of the last breath, entrepreneurs have to fight innumerable battles: political, cultural, economical, sociological, psychological, metaphysical, geopolitical, hereditary and biological. The world today reflects a complex, unpredictable and incalculable

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European Investment Fund (EIF): EUR 180m of Loans for Microbusinesses Across Europe Under Progress Microfinance

After completing his 26-month military service, Andronikos (23) set up his own car wash business on his parent’s land. The land in Episkopi had been unused for a few years and even though he had thought of opening a carwash

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