International Investment Banking The opportunities for investment, underwriting, and M&A are extensive n foreign markets (see Chapter 22). All the large investment banks have sought expansion into international finance, with significant repre- in foreign Several major American firms have made and ongoing investments to establish major enormous capital allocations offices in London and Tokyo Globalization is the new byword of investment ba Financing has become a multimarket search for the lowest cost of capital for issuers, and a 24-hour-a-day quest for the highest return for investors. Enhanced Financing Efficiency. Both issuers and investors seek the optimum level of risk for a given level of return. Such optimiza- tions cover the uncertainties and volatilities of interest rates, currency exchange rates, credit availability (for users of capital), credit instabil- ity (for providers of capital), and equity investments. optimum risk for a given return, or conversely optimum return for a given level of risk, is achieved by using techniques of finance theory such as hedg ing and diversification. The international expansion of one's investment horizons allows more efficient optimization procedures for both issuers and investors--that investment portfolios can be diversified more thereby expanding their risklreturn frontier and achieving higher efficiency Debt-Equity swaps. A new area of international investment banking involves the debtร obligations of the Third World and how such complex and emotional issues can be resolved. Debt restructuring plans are one method (they are not unlike corporate restructuring programs for troubled companies). A more innovative approach is debt-equity swaps, in which local, foreign country debt is exchanged for ownership positions in local operating companies. Such swaps are complex and must articulate the diverse interests of multiple parties