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Third Annual In-House Counsel Event

A new raft of financial services reforms opens the way for more competition from abroad, among other significant reforms. By Paul Belanger of Blake, Cassels & Graydon, Toronto

Avoiding censure from the European Commission, France has dropped its restrictive practices on Eurofranc management and listings. By Gilles Endréo of Linklaters & Paines, Paris

Former special counsel at the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Walter Van Dorn, is to join the London office of US firm Rogers & Wells. Based for a transition period in the firm's Washington DC office, he expects to be permanently resident in the UK by around October. Van Dorn expects to work on ADR offerings and listing of non-US companies on US exchanges. "London is really the hub for trans-national and international work. With the fall of the communist bloc that demand increased," he says. "Rogers & Wells was looking for US lawyers as are a lot of US firms. European companies need this sort of advice, and it is convenient to have the skills on offer in London so clients can cut right to the chase."

Beijing Datang Power Generation Company has listed on both the London and Hong Kong stock exchanges. It is the first Chinese company to have an equity listing in London. The share offer raised about US$400 million and was made possible by the signing last October of a Memorandum of Understanding by regulators and exchanges in the UK and China.

As mentioned in last month's International Financial Law Review (see page 56) a parliamentary committee has suggested a wide-ranging reform of the Companies Act, in particular proposing rules allowing companies to repurchase their own shares.

Two recent Court of Appeal decisions in Hong Kong each touched on an issue of concern to banks in their dealings with customers and third parties: first, whether a mortgagee is bound by a Mareva injunction, and secondly whether a trust can be impressed on deposits secured by contract.

First Bank System of Minnesota is making an agreed US$8.7 billion all-share bid for US Bancorp. The merged bank will be known as US Bancorp, and will be the eighth-largest US bank by market capitalization. The deal highlights the trend towards geographic consolidation among US banks.

The Danish rules on netting are found in Sections 57 and 58 of the Securities Trading Act (STA) of December 20 1995 which entered into force on May 1 1996.

The Basle Committee’s Tier 3 capital rules enable banks to hold capital against market risks. Here is how US banks can take advantage. By Edward G Eisert, Isaac B Lustgarten and Lynn S Kaplan, Schulte Roth & Zabel LLP, New York