Lloyds Banking Group chief executive António Horta-Osório said he will not take an annual bonus for 2011, a year in which the company's shares fell by 60%.

Most investors would be better off using index funds than active managers, but high quality corporates can still prosper in 2012, according to Terry Smith.

Continued pressures on the eurozone and an environment of falling inflation will prompt the ECB to lower interest rates from 1% to 0.5% this year, according to M&G's Stefan Isaacs.

Thames River has hired UBS head of credit trading Brett Golledge as part of a revamp of its credit team which will also see COO Chris Currington and manager Mehrdad Noorani leave the business.

The European Central Bank has held interest rates at 1% but president Mario Draghi has voiced concerns over the situation in Hungary.

8 QUESTIONS ON JAPAN

WHY GERMAN YIELDS COULD FALL FURTHER

An end may be in sight to the daily volatility which confounded investors last year, according to Ben Gill, manager of the £509m Legal & General Global Macro Themes fund.

PIMCO has confirmed it will launch a low-cost tracker version of the PIMCO Total Return fund for US investors on 1 March.

The public's willingness to accept economic reform may be a greater problem for Europe this year than the stubbornness of the ECB, according to the managers of the Ruffer Investment Company.