Wall Street: regulators fight bankers - and each other

New York's Eliot Spitzer has launched a campaign against conflicts of interest between analysts and investment bankers. Now the SEC has joined in - much to the aggravation of Mr Spitzer. But despite this turf war, banks certainly need to initiate change to avoid tarnishing their credibility and destroying client confidence.

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Wall Street: despised by Americans, according to Bloomberg

The recent Bloomberg National Poll reveals negative consumer sentiment towards the banking community is still present in the US, with over 50% of those surveyed expressing an unfavorable opinion about these institutions. However, Datamonitor's Financial Services Consumer Insight survey may bring some reassurance to industry players.

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UBS: ditching Warburg and PaineWebber

UBS, the world's biggest private bank, wants its identity to rival HSBC and Citigroup. It will ditch its well-known Warburg and PaineWebber brands - taking a $1 billion write-off on the discarded names. While the move should eventually pay off in attracting new business, the short-term upheaval may scare conservative private banking customers away.

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Morgan Stanley: buying into China

Morgan Stanley has acquired Nan Tung Bank, a small bank based in China's Guangdong Province. Although the Chinese bank has only one branch and less than 40 employees, the deal provides Morgan Stanley with a much sought-after banking license for the Chinese market, and thus could well prove a shrewd investment.

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More email woe for Morgan Stanley

Morgan Stanley is in trouble again over its historical emails, having been accused of inappropriately deleting millions of emails it claims were lost in the 9/11 attack. Although many of the facts are in dispute, the bank is clearly unsure which emails it had back-ups of, the periods they covered, and where they were stored, which highlights yet again the importance of email management strategies.

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Merrill Lynch: taking the rap for its peers

Mr Spitzer wants Merrill to pay $100 million and admit it issued biased stock notes. But Merrill is unlikely to settle: an admission of guilt would draw legal action from its clients, and there's little evidence it behaved worse than its peers. Rather than scapegoating Merrill for an industry's mistakes, regulators should focus on improving future disclosure across the industry.

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KPMG Consulting: Teutonic triumph follows Anglo failure

Following the US consultancy unit's float in 2001, KPMG is now separating its consultancy and auditing businesses elsewhere. This deal is good news for the US firm, which last week lost out to Atos for KPMG's UK and Dutch consultancy units: a global offering is increasingly vital for IT services firms. However, M&A alone won't end the ongoing industry downturn.

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Julius Baer strengthens its "second home market"

Julius Baer and Macquarie Group have entered into a strategic collaboration agreement. The agreement will combine the private banking and investment banking expertise of both institutions to better serve clients in Asia Pacific.

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Goldman Sachs: not quite an epoch-making deal

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Fleet Boston: back to basics

Fleet wants to direct more of its resources into its consumer and wholesale banking operations. It's a good idea - financial services firms need to focus on their core competencies to maximize profitability in a soft economy. However, Fleet's challenge will be to achieve this focus while also rebuilding the credibility and confidence of its most faithful and profitable customers.

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