Search results for

Ji Liu,

ISDA has endorsed the use of PRIME Finance arbitration clauses in standard derivatives documentation

For some time now, the US has been under pressure to regulate and enforce laws on offshore accounts. The biggest gun in the government's arsenal against undeclared offshore accounts came in the form of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (Fatca), originally passed in 2010, that will take effect in July 2014. This new provision would require foreign financial institutions to report information about their US account holders to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

Ignacio Buil Aldana Act 14/2013, of September 27 2013, favouring entrepreneurs and their internationalisation (the Act), has introduced a wide range of reforms on several insolvency, corporate, tax and labour matters. Regarding insolvencies, the Act (among other changes) significantly reduces the quorum of financial creditors required for court-sanctioned refinancing agreements. It also includes a new out-of-court device in order for debtors and creditors to reach payment agreements binding dissident creditors. With respect to the court-sanctioned refinancing (the so called Spanish scheme), the Act lowers the 75% (of financial debt) support threshold required under additional provision 4 of the Insolvency Act to court-sanction a refinancing agreement to a mere 55%. Further, the Act clarifies that that quorum be superimposed on the quorum required for refinancing agreements under article 71.6 of the Insolvency Act (60% of total debt, including financial debt), in line with both doctrine and case law. This reform is aimed at facilitating Spanish schemes by simplifying and lowering the threshold to reach the relevant majorities. This, of course, may have an effect on existing and future Spanish restructurings even if other key issues such as the ability to cram-down secured creditors is still uncertain, despite relevant developments in this regard (such as the Celsa case).

On July 22 2013, the new EU regime on licensing and supervision of alternative investment funds (AIFs) took effect, as Delegated Regulation (231/2013) supplementing the Directive on Alternative Investment Fund Managers (2011/61/EU) (the AIFMD) entered into force. Cyprus had already transposed the AIFMD into national law earlier in July, in the form of the Alternative Investment Fund Managers Law of 2013 (Law 56(I) of 2013: the AIFM Law).

John Breslin The Irish Parliament passed the Personal Insolvency Act 2012 (the Act) in December 2012, as part of its commitment to reform key areas of Irish law in the context of troika funding. It is being implemented over the course of 2013, and is not yet fully in force. The Act represents a major reform of personal insolvency law, creating new processes as an alternative to bankruptcy. The suitability of any of the new processes in a given situation will depend on the level of the debt, and whether it is secured or unsecured. The Act also makes fundamental changes to bankruptcy law in Ireland. It has significant implications for banks holding or purchasing distressed assets. The highlights of the Act are as follows:

Who took home what from IFLR’s expanded 2013 awards ceremony

How to use Europe’s first model block transaction agreements, and how they will benefit the market

There was a time when the heady combination of economic liberalisation and technology seemed fated to drive ever-increasing volumes of goods, capital and people across borders. Global cross-border capital flows, for example – including lending, foreign direct investment, and equity and bond purchases – rose from $0.5 trillion in 1980 to a peak of $11.8 trillion in 2007, according to the McKinsey Global Institute.

It is hard not to wonder if Standard & Poor's (S&P) has been gloating through the latest US debt ceiling fiasco.