Marine Midland, a subsidiary of Hongkong Shanghai Bank, have clearly
placed heavy emphasis on foreign exchange trading as an important source
of noninterest income. The group as a whole increased foreign exchange
trading income fourfold during the period, from $743 million in 1984 to
over $2.7 billion in 1993.

Consultants and other experts who offer services predicting market
behavior, or access to "inside thinking" on the part of government offi-
cials, make a good living, but there is little evidence that they know any
more than the market reveals in the price of the instruments and contracts.
Technical trading strategies can be successful, but like all trading, success
seems mainly to depend on discipline, courage, capital, technical skills,
and experience. Most market-makers would also add that good luck plays
a major role in successful trading. Most of their supervisors would add
that effective internal control procedures are also essential.

International money and foreign exchange markets have developed enor-
mously over the past several years. This is largely the result of increasing
trade and international investment, but it also reflects improvements in
technology and know-how on the part of the major banks and their cli-
ents. The once modest Eurocurrency money market has now emulated its
U.S. counterpart in variety of instruments available for trading, in types of
investors served, and even in volume of trading. Global investors and issu-
ers of securities now have a very large choice of instruments and rates,
and they may move from one market to the next in search of a better deal.
Such choices serve to bring rates together and thereby integrate the money
markets in the United States with those outside it. As the Eurocurrency

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