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Allen & Overy is gaining an office in Bangkok as a result of its merger with local firm MPS & Associates. The firm already has regional offices in Beijing, Hong Kong, Singapore & Tokyo. MPS & Associates is a 18 lawyer corporate firm, working with international as well as domestic clients. It is well regarded for its banking and capital markets work. The three existing partners of MPS & Associates – Pises Sethsathira, Simon Makinson and Surapon Satimanont – will become partners in Allen & Overy on November 1.

Stephen Mulrenan reports from Tokyo where the changes to the permitted activities for registered lawyers have left foreign lawyers frustrated

The negotiations between Denton Hall, Richards Butler and Theodore Goddard over a possible three-way merger have been called off. The merger would have created the seventh largest law firm based in the UK, according to statistics gathered for the recently published 1999 edition of the International Financial Law Review 1000 directory. While the firms found they had a very good fit in London, that situation was not reflected overseas. Although the press release mentions "difficulties in merging the Hong Kong offices of Denton Hall and Richards Butler", sources close to the talks indicate that it proved impossible to reconcile the Asian aims of Denton Hall with the independence insisted on by the Hong Kong office of Richards Butler.

Securitization is rapidly becoming a common financing technique in Italy with new regulations modelled on foreign securitization rules. By Raffaele Rizzi of Baker & McKenzie, London

US firms suffered from the effects of the Asian crisis on Latin America, but benefited from a thriving market at home, while Canadian firms enjoyed an increasing involvement in global equity offerings. Barbara Galli reports

Richard Parolai and Michael Elland-Goldsmith of Clifford Chance, Paris, advisers to CSFB

Yusaku Ono of Hamada & Matsumoto, Tokyo discusses the new tax laws for Japanese issues and the IPMA operating manual which aims to ease market compliance

Two recent cases have considered the scope of two types of provision commonly found in loan agreements, bond and other debt instruments.

Goldman Sachs’ strategy for Shell — to obtain funding at the lowest cost through currency swaps — has failed so far before the Canadian courts. Ron Schlumpf of CIBC Wood Gundy, Toronto explains the regulatory risks of derivatives

Under a government decree (finance ministry, April 13 1998) a commission has been created to prepare a report on the status of Portuguese international tax laws. The report will: