... The downturn has brought mixed fortunes for at least one CRC initiative - the University of Sydney-based Capital Markets CRC, which conducts research around crossmarket abuses such as insider trading and market manipulation.

Chief executive and professor of finance Alex Frino says two industry partners have given notice that they will be scaling back their financial involvement in the centre as a direct consequence of budget pressures following the economic downturn.

One of the partners is a local funds manager, the other is an international stock exchange. On the flip side, the centre has acquired four new industry partners "as a direct consequence of research needed as a result of the crisis", Frino says. "So on a net basis we've done well and the crisis has created new work for us that wasn't there before." ...

The Australian Financial Review, Page 60, 24 March 2009