All the Singapore and Jakarta-based foreign lawyers with whom ALB spoke seem to do basically the same work: complex, big-money, cross-border deals for their multinational clients.

Local Singaporean firms like Rajah & Tann (one of the biggest names in restructuring) complete some of this genre of work as well (after all, APP has kept many local lawyers busy for a long time). And major business events are par for the course in Singapore. For instance, has anyone heard of Barings? Rajah & Tann were involved in this restructuring after the bank and its rogue trader made worldwide front pages in 1995.

Rajah & Tann partner Lee Eng Beng agrees with the foreign lawyers on most things but particularly the fact that his insolvency division doesn't exactly twiddle its thumbs in times of prosperity. Some of these cases take a long time to resolve, despite the best efforts of everyone involved. For instance, Barings is still carrying on. Some of the cases we are still handling now stem from the 1997 crisis.

In better times, there may be more to litigate or restructure. Businesses may have more value and there is more money around for white knights [the opposite of corporate raiders, these organisations or individuals come in and buy-out distressed companies to save them, rather than dissolving them and selling off the assets] to inject into ailing companies.

Meanwhile Singh comments that Singapore survived the crisis quite well because the world economy was moving OK. Now much more is going wrong along with a general global malaise as well as the outbreak of SARS in Asia. This may result in an increase in the number of local restructurings. As I said earlier, we might have to wait until the beginning of next year to see confident recovery.

The secrets of successful restructuring

Reports last year from JP Morgan indicate that only 25% of post-1997 crisis restructurings have been successful in achieving an increased credit rating for the restructuring target.

Achievement of success or failure was calculated by observing the prices achieved for outstanding bonds. If bond prices increased then the restructuring was successful as the restructured company was now less likely to default.

JP Morgan's analysts found four characteristics common to the successful case studies they analysed:

• divesting the company of non-core   businesses
• realistic cashflow projections
• honest debt-servicing commitments
• checks and balances such as    dividend restrictions