Thursday's headlines: Citi beefs up its emerging markets desks in N.Y. and London

Citigroup, the fourth-biggest underwriter of international emerging-market bonds, is hiring strategists and traders in London and New York, according to a Bloomberg article which reports that merging-market economies are forecast to expand 6.3% this year, compared with 2.2% for developed nations.

Recent adds include Rodney Thomas who was named corporate credit strategist for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. He was previously at Thames River Capital. He will be based in London where he will be joined by new hire Eric Ollom, who previously worked at Jefferies, and Bevan Rosenbloom, who was hired from RBS Securities as a credit research analyst.

The bank also hired as emerging-market corporate debt traders Ray Khan from Morgan Stanley, Arkady Lefkowitz of Banco Santander, and Steve Gooden from Macquarie Bank. Deutsche Bank is the biggest underwriter of international emerging market debt this year.

Other news:

The pace of bank mergers is expected to remain slow. [DealBook]

Hedge fund giant K2 Advisors has begun talks with potential suitors about a potential sale. [NY Times]

The SEC approved a new definition for venture capital funds, offering them some relief from Dodd-Frank. [DealBook]

The SEC approved new rules that would impose sweeping disclosure requirements on large hedge funds and other private investment adviserors.[NY Times]

The rogue blog by a summer analyst at an L.A. investment bank was gone by its second day. [NY Times]

U.S. property and casualty insurers posted the biggest underwriting loss since 2008. [BusinessWeek]

Google and Citigroup will invest $204 million for the largest U.S. wind farm. [WSJ]

Global millionaires' ranks rose by 8.3% last year as the Asia-Pacific region overtook Europe for the first time. [Financial Times]

The TMX Group's plan to merge with the London Stock Exchange won the backing of Institutional Shareholder Services. [DealBook]

Pioneer Investments, a unit of Italy's UniCredit, will move its investment activities in Singapore to London. [BusinessWeek]