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The understandable haste of Asian governments to create insolvency frameworks to revitalize their post-1997 economies has created as many problems as it has solved. Robert Zafft of the OECD and Lampros Vassiliou of Allens Arthur Robinson explain

In a significant development for Georgian tax legislation, the president of Georgia on April 19 2002 approved instructions outlining detailed procedures for the registration of taxpayers and the maintenance of a tax registry at district, zonal and regional levels (Decree 155). The instructions include forms to be filled out at the time of registration, reorganization or liquidation, and call for the collection of extensive information on taxpayers.

Japanese legal procedures relating to insolvency are undergoing substantial reform. As a part of these reforms, many amendments to the Corporate Reorganization Law were promulgated on December 13 2002 and are scheduled to take effect on April 1 2003. The pre-amendment Corporate Reorganization Law provided a very rigid reorganization procedure, especially for large-scale companies with many creditors, employees and other stakeholders. The main purposes of the amendments are to create a swift reorganization procedure for companies and to establish more flexible reorganizing measures.

According to a new notice recently promulgated in China, even if the capital contribution of all foreign investors of an enterprise is lower than 25% of the enterprise's registered capital, the approval and registration procedures of that enterprise will be the same as those of a foreign-invested enterprise (FIE). However, such an enterprise cannot enjoy the preferential tax arrangement that FIEs enjoy. If the investor pays its contribution in cash, it must pay off its capital contribution within three months after the business licence is issued. If the investor makes its contribution in kind, it must pay off its capital contribution within six months.

The revision of the exemption regulation that has caused problems for borrowers (see main feature) has also affected securititizations, putting billions of dollars of transactions temporarily at risk.

Life for foreigners issuing securities in The Netherlands has been made more difficult by a recent amendment to the law. Michael Evans reports on what lawyers are doing to change this

Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld and London law firm Herbert Smith will have helped to close the largest corporate deal in Russia if the Azerbaijani government agrees to the $1.4 billion sale of Lukoil's stake in one of the country's large oil fields.

Spanish lawyers say the government must clarify proposed changes to the country's takeover laws. Last month the Spanish government confirmed it would announce amendments to the rules governing tender offers that will force bidders to make more mandatory takeover offers.

Companies listed in Hong Kong will face tougher corporate governance requirements that include having more independent directors and capping discounts on share placements.

France's stock market regulator, the Commission des Opérations de Bourse (Cob) is to make an in-depth analysis of deals structured using derivatives to raise capital.