Search results for

Harvey Pitt: ending on a high note As with many leaders, Securities and Exchange (SEC) chairman Harvey Pitt overcame his lame-duck position in his last days in office to make some final points. In one such move he put the banning of payment for order flows back on the agenda for his successor to look at once he has settled into his Washington DC office.

Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer won eight awards, including IFLR European Law Firm of the Year, at International Financial Law Review's awards dinner last night. The UK firm clinched the overall award for its work in capital markets, M&A, project finance and restructuring during 2002.

In an exclusive interview with IFLR, Arthur M Mitchell, the Asian Development Bank's new general counsel, explains how the Bank's commitment to working with the private sector can spur legal reform across the region. Reducing the bad debt burden is top of his list. By Andrew Crooke

Private equity investors are increasingly seeking post-WTO investment opportunities in China, but risk management techniques are essential if the new directors do not want to fall foul of the law. By Michael J Moser and Seung Chong of Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, Hong Kong

An Australian court has ruled that the experts consulted to provide quotations for the calculation of a close-out amount under an Isda Master Agreement should have used a valuation method radically different from the one commonly accepted. The decision has implications for the valuation of Isda-based derivatives, says Andrew Fernbach of Mallesons Stephen Jaques

In early February, the Supreme Economic Council (SEC) issued a revised Negative List of industries in the Saudi economy in which foreign investment is prohibited. The SEC recently announced that it will permit foreign investment in the following three industrys that appeared on the initial Negative List issued in February 2001: electrical energy distribution services; pipeline transport services; and educational services, including primary, secondary and adult education.

A new Act has significantly amended Ukraine's corporate profit tax regime, effectively decreasing the overall tax burden and eliminating many ambiguities thought responsible for conflicts with tax authorities (Act of Ukraine No 349-IV, effective January 1 2003). The main effects of the new Act are as follows:

The Financial Services and Markets Act provides a simple way to reorganize banks. John Odgers, a barrister from 3 Verulam Buildings, London, answers key questions about how the process works

Unlike the legislation in most other European jurisdictions, the Swedish Companies Act or any other similar piece of Swedish legislation does not specifically address public offers and other forms of corporate takeovers. Even though the regulation on takeovers in Sweden underlies statutory law, the Swedish securities market is highly influenced by self-regulatory recommendations. The main source of information regarding takeovers is the Recommendation concerning Public Offers for the Acquisition of Shares issued by the Swedish Industry and Commerce Stock Exchange Committee (NBK). Stock market companies that are listed on the Stockholm Exchange are obliged to enter into a listing agreement with the Stockholm Exchange, of which a number of NBK-recommendations are made part. Consequently, non-listed companies are not contractually bound by the recommendations. Failure to comply with the requirements in the takeover regulation would result in bad feeling and criticism from the Swedish securities Council (Sw. Aktiemarknadsnämnden) and Swedish media and, in the case of a listed company, the Stockholm Exchange might decide to de-list the company's shares from the exchange.

Portugal will soon have a legal diploma foreseeing and regulating undertakings for collective investments in transferable securities (Ucits) under statute through the form of securities investment companies with variable capital (SICAV) and securities investment companies with fixed capital (SICAF).