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On June 4 2008, the Seoul High Court (Court) handed down a decision on a criminal case brought by the Prosecutor's Office concerning a leveraged buyout (LBO) transaction. This was the third and final decision after the case was taken to the Court by the Korean Supreme Court on two occasions. The heart of the issue was the question of when a director may be held liable for a breach of fiduciary duty in the context of approving financial arrangements commonly used in LBO transactions.

Romania's Accession Treaty to the European Union contains the commitment to transpose and implement, among others, Directive 2005/60/CE on the prevention of the use of the financial system for the purpose of money laundering and terrorist financing, as well as Directive 2006/70/CE, which lays down implementation measures for Directive 2005/60/CE regarding the definition of a politically exposed person, the technical criteria for simplified customer due diligence procedures and exemption on grounds of a financial activity conducted on an occasional or very limited basis.

Debt Four firms are advising on The Commercial Bank of Qatar's $900 million listing of global depository receipts (GDRs) – the first by a Qatari listed company in nearly 10 years. Simmons & Simmons advised the Commercial Bank of Qatar on Qatari law including the private placement and pre-emptive rights issue. It also advised Morgan Stanley and Société Générale on Qatari law. Clifford Chance represented The Commercial Bank of Qatar on UK and US law, while Davis Polk & Wardwell and Slaughter and May advised the sole global coordinator, Morgan Stanley, on US and UK law.

Asia's disparate jurisdictions do create problems. But companies benefit from lighter regulation, argue James Wadham and Andrew Whan

In mid-June, the SEC issued several proposed rules relating to rating agencies, designed to increase transparency and avoid conflicts of interest in the credit ratings process. Nationally recognised statistical rating agencies (NSROs) will be required to be registered and certified annually by the SEC. In the aftermath of the subprime crisis, NSROs have been widely criticised for inaccurate initial ratings of mortgage-backed and asset-backed securities and poor transaction surveillance. Critics have also pointed to conflicts of interest that they perceive to have resulted from the practice of NSROs providing structuring advice to issuers and financial intermediaries, as well as the practice of NSROs being paid directly by issuers or their underwriters.

In 2006, the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and the Ministry of Law launched a joint public consultation on the proposed changes to the unsecured credit rules and the proposed application of these rules (with appropriate modifications) to moneylenders. In 2007, the MAS conducted another consultation on exemption for financial institutions from the maximum credit limit when granting credit to individuals with greater financial means. Following feedback received from the public, the MAS and the Ministry of Law published draft legislations for unsecured credit rules for financial institutions and unsecured lending rules for moneylenders respectively in the Consultation Paper (December 2007) for public comment.

O'Melveny & Myers represented China Distance Education, an online education provider, on its IPO on the NYSE Arca.

Those keen to enter the attractive world of Romanian real estate should listen up, says Roxana Negutu of Voicu & Filipescu

Plus all the news analysis from the rest of the month

How Mifid affects trading across EU borders, particularly in Switzerland