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A $30 billion restructuring deal will merge the financial services division of BAT Industries and Zurich Insurance. BAT shareholders will own a 45% interest in the merged group, through a listed UK holding company. Zurich Insurance shareholders will own 55%, through a listed Swiss holding company. The new group will be called Allied Zurich. BAT Industries will spin off its tobacco industries into a new company, BAT.

Foreign investment flooded into Latin America in 1997, but investors should note that the region cannot be treated as a homogeneous unit, both in terms of tax rules, and in terms of the level of advice provided. Phillippa Cannon and Moray Borthwick report

Federal-Mogul has made an agreed cash offer of $2.43 billion to acquire the UK group T&N. The combined group will be a leading global supplier of automotive parts with 42% of its revenue in North America, 44% in Europe and 14% in the rest of the world.

British Aerospace and Daimler-Benz Aerospace have made a joint purchase of the Siemens Defence Electronics Group. British Aerospace will acquire Siemens Plessey Systems in the UK, and Siemens Plessey Electronic Sytems in Australia. Daimler-Benz Aerospace will acquire Siemens Bereich Sicherungs-technik in Germany. The total value of the deal has not been announced, but British Aerospace is to pay Dm930 million ($530 million) for the two businesses. The deal represents British Aerospace's third acquisition in Germany this year.

Tomkins has made a £70.5 million ($114.2 million) successful bid to acquire Golden West Foods.

US telecommunications group MCI Communications has agreed to merge with WorldCom, the US long-distance telephone operator. The deal is valued at $37 billion.

Publishing groups Reed Elsevier of the UK and Wolters Kluwer of the Netherlands have reached agreement to merge, in a £20 billion ($33 billion) deal. The combined market capitalization of the merged group will be £17.5 billion.

On November 12 1997, the UK Inland Revenue published draft legislation bringing controlled foreign corporations (CFCs) into the corporation tax self-assessment regime. Under the current system, a direction must be made by the Inland Revenue Board before a CFC tax charge can be imposed. Once self-assessment is underway, UK companies will be responsible for self-assessing and reporting their CFC liabilities.

UK energy group BG plans to return up to £1.3 billion ($2.1 billion) of its share capital to shareholders. On October 27 1997, shareholders voted in favour of the company's proposed capital reorganization. The number of ordinary shares in the issue will be reduced by 11.8% to reflect how much of the company's current market capitalization is being returned to shareholders. In this way the cost of capital to the company will be reduced with the greater use of debt rather than equity finance.

The Bank of Ireland has made a IR £274 million ($465 million) bid for life assurance company New Ireland Holdings. Linklaters in London acted for Sun Life and Provincial Holdings, which owns an 83% shareholding in New Ireland. Tax advice on the deal came from tax partner Mike Hardwick and tax associate Liz Conway.