Starbucks had wanted to buy about half of Tully's 47 shops in Washington and California and turn them into Starbucks stores, while the rest of the company would keep the Tully's name under the ownership of AgriNurture, which is based in the Philippines.

MSN: Judge: Tully's Coffee to go to Dempsey's group

We gave special honors to Philweb of the Philippines (top profitability, based on operating income as a share of sales), to Royal Ceramics Lanka of Sri Lanka (return on investment, a near quintupling) and to E-House (China), the real-estate brokerage, for overall best composite score.

FORBES: Hong Kong's Tears for the USA

Things should be better in the Philippines, where there is a bankruptcy statute based on American law.

ECONOMIST: Bankruptcy in Asia

For his 1995 visit to the Philippines, local car maker Francisco Motors produced a Popemobile based on a 4x4.

CNN: Holy rollers: Popemobiles from trucks to limos

Based on his experiences as a soldier in the Philippines, it sold 200, 000 copies and was acclaimed by critics, many of whom regarded it as one of the finest novels of the post-war period.

CNN: Newsmaker: Norman Mailer

Glenda Gloria, a Manila-based author and historian, notes that residents of the Philippines' Muslim provinces frequently traveled back and forth between Malaysia and Indonesia, trading and speaking a similar language before European and American colonizers introduced national boundaries.

WSJ: Malaysia Flare-Up Illustrates Volatility

Yields on sovereign debt issued within Indonesia, the Philippines and other Asian countries are significantly higher than yields on dollar-based bonds.

ECONOMIST: The new problem with Asian sovereign debt��scarcity

The Philippines said it expected legal proceedings to take between three and four years, based on previous cases.

BBC: Philippines 'to take South China Sea row to court'