BRAZIL'S THE PLACE FOR CAUTION.

The 100 least leveraged international banks are presented. Some Third World banks are in much better shape than the countries they are based in. Arab and Brazilian banks are among the world's most conservatively run institutions. Their assets-to-equity ratio is within what blue chip New York banks would have. The lowest bank on this list has a ratio of 14.99 times equity, modest in comparison to the average of 21.6 times equity of the 12 money center banks in the United States. Seven Bahraini and four Singapore banks are among the least leveraged in the global banking business, they average 8.7 times equity.