Issues

Highlights: The new Foreign Investment Industrial Guidance Catalogue encourages foreign investment in more areas by removing several restrictions and adding several encouraged industries.  Caps on foreign equity are lifted in some industries. The New Catalogue promotes investment in energy-saving, environmental protection, new-generation information technology, biology, high-end equipment manufacturing, new energy, new materials, and new energy … Continued

Highlights:  M&A activity in Ireland has been affected by global and national economic difficulties experienced over the past three years, but Ireland’s M&A activity has recovered from the historic lows experienced in 2009.  This recovery looks set to gather pace in 2012. Much of Ireland’s M&A activity during 2011 was driven by the restructuring of … Continued

Highlights For the first time, the Italian Stock Exchange Commission applied a law of 2007 that enables it to order the launch of a tender offer, or impose a fine, for breach or circumvention of the mandatory tender offer rules. Previously the sanctions, which proved ineffective, consisted of a fine, the freezing of voting rights, … Continued

Highlights:  The Netherlands has become an attractive venue for settling international mass claims, irrespective of whether any litigation has taken place in the Netherlands. The Netherlands is the only European jurisdiction offering a procedure to declare a collective settlement binding on all class members on an “opt out” basis. Recently, the Amsterdam Court of Appeal … Continued

Highlights:  Businesses operating in Canada should be aware of a recent trend towards greater regulation and enforcement action surrounding pricing representations where additional costs are not clearly disclosed up front. The federal government’s planned regulation of airline advertising, the Competition Bureau’s recent aggressive enforcement initiatives regarding price representations as well recent class actions involving pricing … Continued

Highlights: Changes have been proposed to the Singapore Code on Take-overs and Mergers (“Code”). The main changes include updating the language of the Code to incorporate current practices on the takeover of real estate investment trusts and business trusts, setting out when collective shareholder action amounts to acting in concert, and dealing with joint offers … Continued

Highlights:  On January 16, 2012, the Public Private Partnerships Act (“PPP Act”) was published and amendments were made to several related laws (the Law of Acquisitions, Law of Public Works, Expropriation Law, and National Assets Law) with the intention to consolidate a market practice that has been carried out without a clear legal framework. The … Continued

Executive summary:  The linked memorandum identifies the issues facing financial institutions that do not have sufficiently positive and proactive relationships with their regulators to influence the ways in which new regulatory principles and rules will be applied to them, explains how some of the traditional responses of financial institutions to regulatory change are now outdated, … Continued

Highlights:  New legislation reduces the income tax applicable to income from debentures issued by special purpose companies (SPCs) incorporated to carry out infrastructure investment projects or projects for intensive economic production in research, development and innovation that are deemed “priorities” by the federal government. Legal entities domiciled in Brazil are subject to a 15% tax … Continued

Highlights:  New amendments to the Federal Law on Foreign Investment in the Russian Federation and the Federal Law on Foreign Investment in Companies of Strategic Importance for National Defence and Security generally improve the environment for foreign investments in Russian strategic companies. Transactions involving international financial institutions set up in accordance with international treaties of … Continued