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Beatriz Causapé Guayente Gállego Spanish Royal Decree-Law 4/2014, passed on March 7 2014, has considerably changed the rules for the court-sanctioning of so-called Spanish schemes of arrangement. Among those changes, the reform has lowered the majorities required to achieve a Spanish scheme. Currently, a majority of at least 51% of the financial liabilities held by all creditors at the time of the refinancing agreement (acuerdo de refinanciación) approval, will suffice to request the insolvency judge to sanction the agreement, so it is considered ring-fenced and protected from any challenge for rescission.

Oene Marseille Emir Nurmansyah Indonesia has shortened its review process by 30 days for the issuance of the principal licence, considered to be the preliminary licence before the final issuance of the borrow-to-use permit (Izin Pinjam Pakai) for its forest areas. Indonesia's Minister of Forestry decreed this in its updated guidelines on the issuance of borrow-to-use permits for forest areas in Indonesia. Under the new guidelines (Regulations of the Ministry of Forestry), the principal licence review process is shortened from a maximum of 120 business days to 90 business days. The review process for the issuance of the borrow-to-use permit itself, for which the principle licence is a prerequisite, remains unchanged (a maximum review period of 90 days is prescribed). Further, the new guidelines have left untouched a bulk of the old procedures and mechanisms. For example, the provisions dealing with general application procedures, requisite supporting documents, applicant's obligations and the required compensatory actions remain the same. The borrow-to-use permit is issued by the Minister of Forestry of Indonesia. This permit is one of the most important, yet onerous licences to obtain before conducting any natural resource exploration and exploitation activities in a forest area in Indonesia. Industries traditionally affected by this permit requirement include oil and gas, geothermal, coal and other minerals, power generation, lumber, and plantations.

Carlos Fradique-Mendez María Andrea Estrada Rugeles On March 6 2014, the Colombian Stock Exchange became the fourth stock market in Latin America to adopt a market makers programme (the programme). The programme permits the structuring and implementation of a stockbroker's commitment to buy or sell equity shares, in order to increase liquidity of those shares. BlackRock, general partner of the exchange-traded fund (ETF) iCOLCAP in Colombia, instructed Cititrust (who acts as the ETF's administrator) to enter into an agreement with BTG Pactual Colombia (the market maker), for purposes of providing market-making services to promote the liquidity of the ETF shares. The market maker is required to execute daily transactions on its own behalf, with its own funds and on a permanent basis, entering buy and sell bids over the ETF shares. The agreement was recently approved by the Colombian Stock Exchange, becoming the first market maker in Colombia over equity securities.

Elias Neocleous The Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) has issued a circular reminding providers of administrative and corporate services (ASPs) that it supervises their reporting obligations under the Law regulating Companies providing Administrative Services and Related Matters of 2012 (the ASP Law). It draws attention to article 11(1)(c) of the ASP Law, which provides that ASPs whose application for a licence is under consideration by CySEC must comply with the requirements of the ASP Law and CySEC Directive D?144-2007-08 of 2012 for the Prevention of Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing (the AML Directive).

Following the Renewable Energy Act 2011 (RE Act) which came into force in December 2011, the implementation of the feed-in tariff (FIT) mechanism under the RE Act has been an overwhelming success. After the FIT mechanism was implemented in Peninsular Malaysia over a period of two years, Malaysia had a cumulative total of 119MW of renewable energy connected to the grid as opposed to only 61.2MW of renewable energy capacity connected to the grid from the implementation of the earlier, small renewable energy power programme, which spanned a period of 10 years.

Pedro Cortés Marta Mourão Teixeira Legislation on anti-money laundering was passed in Macau in 2006, although there were some previous regulations already providing for it. Law 2/2006 on the prevention and repression of money laundering crimes of April 3 2006, established measures aimed at preventing and suppressing the criminal offence of money laundering. It defined the gains of money laundering as any assets derived from the commission, through any form of participation, of a typified act, which would be punishable with a penalty of imprisonment of a maximum term of three years.

Klaus Henrik Wiese-Hansen Christoffer N Sortland Implementation of the Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive (AIFMD) in Norway is gradually nearing. On February 18 2014, the Ministry of Finance sent a draft for new regulations on public hearing, with a deadline for comments of May 18 2014. This article provides a short summary of the draft regulations, which partly concerns the EU Commission Delegated Regulations under the AIFMD. Norwegian authorities failed to implement the AIFMD within the transposition deadline of July 22 2013. The Ministry of Finance is drafting an AIFM Act, which is expected to be proposed before Easter 2014. Implementation of the AIFMD in Norway will probably take place on or around July 1 2014.

Benjamín Valdez Tamayo Enacted in 2007, the Salvadorian Future Flows Securitisation Act (Ley de Titularizacion de Activos) regulates the issue of bonds through the Salvadorian stock exchange, to be paid by future cash flows generated by a specific asset. Since then, future flows securitisation has become a relevant finance option in El Salvador, for private enterprises and public institutions alike; to this date, more than $100 million in bonds have been issued. Among those entities that have accessed funding through this type of offerings are schools, industrial paper plants, the Salvadorian Department of Transportation, and beach side resorts. Technically speaking, future flows securitisation is the process by which an independent estate is incorporated with assets capable of generating future cash flow (for example, lease agreements, decreasing credit lines, the right of government institutions to collect taxes) and whose sole purpose is the payment of principal and interests of publicly issued bonds. In other words, a company issues securities through a stock exchange (thus obtaining funds for a specific business project) which will be repaid, with interest, with the cash flow generated by the securitised asset. A company, duly authorised by the Superintendenciadel Sistema Financiero (the Salvadoran equivalent to the Securities and Exchange Commission) is tasked with the administration of the assets and the cash flow necessary for the payment of the bonds.

Daniel Futej Daniel Grigel’ The Slovak Republic is looking to toughen criminal prosecution of corporations. It has proposed a special act be adopted and take effect from May 1 2015 that introduces criminal liability for legal persons. The act's aim is to prevent criminal offences from being concealed behind the activities of corporations, and to penalise corporations that have aided in the commission of a criminal offence. It should be noted that the Slovak Republic is the last of the EU member states to introduce criminal liability for legal persons. However an interim measure was introduced by Slovakia in 2010 that allows the courts to punish a legal person by setting a monetary amount, up to and including the entire assets of that legal person, to be seized. The bill spells out the criminal offences a legal person can be charged with. This includes, inter alia, the endangerment of health through defective food products, endangerment of health through unlicensed medicines, blackmail, illegal construction, endangerment and harm to the environment, bribery, false accusations, and unlawful use of personal data. A legal person is considered criminally liable if a criminal offence is committed in its interests, as a part of or through its activities, and at the same time if it was committed by:

Adrian Roseti As of February 1 2014, both Criminal and Criminal Procedure Codes were implemented, replacing regulations that have been in force since 1968, drafted at a time when the political status quo in Romania not only discouraged but even forbade private initiative. Although the previous codes have been subject to several adjustments and substantial case law may have cleared several grey areas, in order to adjust to the realities of the modern economy (for instance, properly defining energy theft, telecommunication resources and internet access and data), the need for new explicit regulation has superseded the conservative approach. Despite the fact that the new provisions were initially announced as imposing milder sanctions, it appears that whereas in specific cases some sanctions have decreased, any multiple offence is now sanctioned in a more drastic manner and in some cases sanctions have even increased (for example in competition law crimes).