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Credit Lyonnais is selling its majority shareholding in Woodchester Investments to GE Capital for a cash consideration of £591 million (US$958 million) to GE Capital. UK firm Allen & Overy and Irish firm William Fry is advising Woodchester and UK firm Clifford Chance is representing GE Capital.

As a follow-up to October’s equities survey, International Financial Law Review asked leading managers and issuers what they look for from their lawyers. A merger is one answer. Nick Ferguson reports

Brown & Wood is set to develop its Latin American capital markets practice by opening an office in São Paulo. New York partner Michael Fitzgerald, co-head of corporate securities and who supervises the Latin America practice, says: "We have a lawyer there who is affiliated with the firm and we are in the process of negotiating a lease. I think we will have some kind of representative office with an associate in São Paulo within the next six months." The move follows announcements from New York rival White & Case and the UK's Linklaters & Paines, that they too are opening São Paulo offices (see International Financial Law Review, October 1997, page 5).

US firm Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton is to open an Italian office in early 1998. Based in Rome, the office will have about eight lawyers, both US and Italian qualified recruited from its other European offices. Cleary Gottlieb will be only the third US firm to open in Italy. However, the decision reflects the growing interest of many US and UK firms in Italy. Ned Stiles, partner ofa firm in Washington, sees the move as a natural progression: "We have a significant amount of business in Italy already, and our assessment was that it was right [to open an office]."

• UK firm Simmons & Simmons has poached Angus Phang from US firm Baker & McKenzie's Hong Kong office. Phang will head the firm's Asia Pacific IP practice as partner Christopher Head moves from Hong Kong to create a New York IP department.The firm has also hired immigration specialist Garth Coates from rival City firm Lovell White Durrant. Coates, former head of immigration at Lovell's will join Hilary Belchak's immigration group at Simmons. "His experience and expertise will be invaluable in enabling us to fulfill the increasingly complex needs of our clients, both in the UK and overseas across all industry sectors," Belchak said.

German firm Bruckhaus Westrick Stegemann is to merge with Austria's Heller, Löber, Bahn & Partners. This, the first cross-border merger between a German and an Austrian firm, takes effect from January 1 1998. "We at Bruckhaus do not want to end up as a German niche firm, we want to be an international firm. We are starting from our home market, the continent," explains Burkhard Bastuck, a partner in Bruckhaus's Frankfurt office. His Dusseldorf-based partner Günter Beckmann agrees: "Focusing our strengths in central Europe will also provide us with a foundation for expanded business in western Europe and in regions with Anglo-American legal traditions."

Amendments to the Securities Act 1978 which came into force on October 1 will almost certainly increase costs for overseas issuers of securities to the New Zealand public. The Securities Commission recently declared that overseas issuers will need to meet the new requirements.

On October 10 1997 the Swiss Parliament passed a new act aimed at combatting money-laundering in the financial sector. This latest legislative step expands on the due diligence requirements of articles 305 bis and ter of the Swiss Penal Code (SPC) and establishes a comprehensive (self-) regulatory framework for Finance Intermediaries. The latter include banks, fund managers, insurance entities and security dealers (article 2 paragraph 2 Intermediaries). It also includes anyone who by profession accepts possession or custody of other persons' assets, or helps to invest or transfer them (article 2 paragraph 3 Intermediaries). The statute exempts: the Swiss National Bank; tax-exempted pension fund entities and person who provide services exclusively to these; and paragraph 3 Intermediaries who provide services exclusively to paragraph 2 Intermediaries.

State of Rio Grande do Sul: On October 21 1997, Companhia Estadual de Energia Elétrica sold two of its three distribution networks for R3.145 billion (US$2.85 billion). The premiums over the minimum asking prices were 82.62% for the Centre-West distributor and 93.55% for the North-Northeast distributor.