Foreign exchange black markets in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Jamaica and Peru were studied during the period 1990-93. This group of case studies presents a broad view of the phenomenon in Latin America at the beginning of the 1990s. This is not a traditional economic analysis of foreign exchange markets, for many reasons. Most importantly, since black markets are illegal by definition, they are not recorded in offical statistics and the participants are not easily identified. Nevertheless, these markets are often widely used and well known to people living in the Latin American countries, so it is possible to paint a reasonably accurate picture of them. The work is based largely on interviews with black market participants in each country. This primary means of collecting information was desirable because of the general lack of published sources of data or other records; though published information was also used when available. The book discusses foreign exchange black markets from a variety of perspectives, looking at who participates in them, how they function, and what impacts they have on local economies.

Money laundering has been around as long as there have been illicit businesses, since criminals have always had to convert their ill-gotten gains into clean financial instruments in order to utilize them in legitimate business. Grosse explores how drug traffickers turn profits from street sales of cocaine and crack into bank accounts, airplanes, securities investments, and other uses. These schemes are both creative and extensive, from shipping suitcases of dollars to Mexico, to buying gold with drug cash in California, to faking the export of clothing from Colombia to Panama. The amounts of money involved are often staggering--hundreds of millions of dollars in most cases. Grosse also considers some of the issues raised by money laundering. He offers advice to banks and other financial institutions that hope to avoid becoming involved in a money laundering process. He examines the social costs and benefits of money laundering, in particular the charge that the rapid development of Miami in the 1980s was due directly to the hundreds of millions of cocaine dollars invested in real estate and businesses by the "cocaine cowboys." Increasing law enforcement has, in Grosse's opinion, only resulted in more clever laundering schemes, and recent discussion about legalizing narcotics will prove even more costly for the United States.

A state-of-the-art guide to evolving functional neurosurgery approaches from world-renowned innovators Functional neurosurgery focuses on improving the lives of patients with epilepsy, movement disorders, pain, and psychiatric illnesses. In recent years, approaches ranging from open surgery to minimally invasive techniques have been leveraged to improve daily functioning and quality of life in people struggling with painful, highly disruptive, and/or treatment-resistant symptoms. These approaches focus on reducing or eliminating seizures, alleviating pain, decreasing abnormal movements or lessening debilitating symptoms associated with specific psychiatric disorders. Neurosurgical Operative Atlas: Functional Neurosurgery, Third Edition, by renowned functional neurosurgeons Robert Gross, Nicholas Boulis, and esteemed contributors reflects the latest advances in functional and stereotactic neurosurgical approaches. The entire atlas has been streamlined and updated with new content, including the use of stereotactic surgery to treat obsessive compulsive disorder, Tourette syndrome, and major depression. Key Highlights A full spectrum of epilepsy treatment techniques, including intracranial monitoring with stereo-electroencephalography, selective amygdalohippocampectomy, MRI-guided stereotactic laser ablation, vagus nerve stimulation, and more Deep brain stimulation (DBS) for Parkinson's disease, tremor, dystonia, epilepsy and medically intractable pain syndromes, with in-depth implantation guidance The use of neurosurgical and interventional techniques to treat pain including percutaneous ablation, peripheral nerve stimulation, spinal cord and motor cortex stimulators, and pumps More than 300 high quality color illustrations detail anatomy and surgical procedures This is the ultimate guide on functional neurosurgery for managing a wide range of incapacitating neurological conditions. Neurosurgical residents, fellows, and veteran neurosurgeons specializing in this rapidly evolving subspecialty will find this state-of-the-art book invaluable — reading it cover to cover will ultimately benefit patients. Series description The American Association of Neurological Surgeons and Thieme have collaborated to produce the third edition of the acclaimed Neurosurgical Operative Atlas series. Edited by leading experts in the field, the series covers the entire spectrum of neurosurgery in five volumes. In addition to Functional Neurosurgery, the series also features: Spine and Peripheral Nerves, edited by Christopher E. Wolfa and Daniel K. Resnick Vascular Neurosurgery, edited by R. Loch Macdonald Neuro-Oncology, edited by Behnam Badie and Mike Y. Chen Pediatric Neurosurgery, edited by James Tait Goodrich and Robert F. Keating