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In Australia, ASHURST in Melbourne recruited M&A partners John Brewster and Shane Kyriakou from Clayton Utz and Herbert Smith Freehills respectively. K&L GATES strengthened its corporate and transactional team with the hire of Matthew Cridland from DLA Piper as a partner in its Sydney office. JONES DAY hired Andrew Smith in Brisbane – he joined as a partner in the firm's energy practice from Clayton Utz.

Beatriz Causapé Laura Torrecilla In a context where Spanish banks continue to sell their non-performing loans (NPLs) to reduce the level of their provisions and improve their solvency ratios, several national and regional rules have been approved, and resolutions passed recently in an attempt to protect debtors, who are often in precarious situations.

Oene Marseille Emir Nurmansyah In December 2016, the Indonesian president issued a new regulation paving the way for Indonesia's ministry of finance to provide land procurement funding to projects with national strategic value, but with insufficient funding to complete the necessary land acquisition.

Susanne Schreiber Cyrill Diefenbacher On February 12 2017, the corporate tax reform III draft (CTR III draft) was rejected in a national referendum. As a result of that rejection, a new bill will have to be elaborated and agreed on within a short time frame by the Federal Council and Parliament. It is still expected that a new bill will introduce certain accompanying fiscal measures aimed at maintaining the international competitiveness of Switzerland, but the bill also needs to be in a form that attracts majority support and counters reservations of expected losses in tax revenues.

The opening of the country’s corporate debt market has attracted investor interest. But attitudes are different when it comes to offshore and onshore issuances

Elias Neocleous The European Securities and Markets Authority (Esma) set out guidelines for the assessment of knowledge and competence in its publication Esma/2015/1886 dated December 17 2015. In preparation for these guidelines which come into force on January 3 2018, the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) has issued a circular (C181 dated February 2 2017) advising Cyprus investment firms (CIFs) on their obligations when providing information to clients on the services and instruments they offer, in order to meet their overriding obligation to act in the best interests of their clients.

The country recently implemented legislation to clamp down on tax evasion. Its effects are wide-ranging

João Nuno Riquito Carlos Eduardo Coelho On November 10 2016, the Macau Special Administrative Region (Macau SAR) legislative assembly unanimously approved the first reading of a bill that proposed amendments to the law on the prevention of money laundering activities – law 2/2016 (AML law). More recently, on January 4 2017, the legislative assembly approved the first reading of a bill that proposed a border currency declaration system for anyone entering or leaving Macau SAR.

Neerg Energy’s dual issuance overcame several regulatory and commercial obstacles

Jose Florante M Pamfilo Recently, the Philippine supreme court voted to deny the petition made in the case of Roy vs Herbosa (GR number 207246) to invalidate SEC Memorandum Circular number 8-2013 (guidelines on compliance with the Filipino-foreign ownership requirements prescribed in the constitution and/or existing laws by corporations engaged in nationalised and partly-nationalised activities) (MC 8-2013) issued by the Philippine securities and exchange commission (SEC).