Legal Notice 59 of 2021 has amended the annual leave provisions in the Organisation of Working Time Regulations (S.L. 452.87). With effect from the 1st of January 2021, the days of annual leave have been reduced from 27 days to 24 days but employees shall be entitled to an additional day of annual leave in respect of public or national holidays falling on a Saturday, Sunday or weekly day of rest ...
Bradley attorneys Aaron Chastain, Lee Gilley, Riley Key, Jonathan Kolodziej, and Robert Maddox authored Chapter 11: Debt Collection Practices in the publication of Consumer Finance Law: Understanding Consumer Financial Services Regulations. A global pandemic, ensuing economic decline, and mandated changes from the Dodd-Frank Act have provided greater challenges and opportunities in the consumer markets resulting in rapid change in the regulatory environment for businesses ...
Good news in times of crisis: The eagerly awaited draft of the Restructuring and Insolvency Directive Implementation Act (RIRL-UG) was published yesterday. The law with which Directive (EU) 2019/1023 (Restructuring Directive) is implemented in Austria is to come into force on July 17, 2021 (at the end of the implementation period). The review phase will run until April 6, 2021 ...
According to the Institute for Family Business, over five million family businesses in the UK generate more than a third of UK GDP. In 2018, the family business sector paid £196 billion in tax (over a quarter of the Government's total revenue) and employed 14 million people in the UK (50% of private sector employment) ...
The UK Government has published the National Security and Investment Bill – a proposed law that will introduce a screening process for certain acquisitions and investments and which is expected to come into force as early as April 2021. The National Security and Investment Bill has now had its second reading and is expected to come into force as early as April 2021. We take a look at what it will cover ...
On 24 February 2021, the Finance Secretary Paul Chan delivered the 2021-22 Budget which highlighted upcoming government initiatives to promote the establishment of and re-domiciliation of offshore funds to Hong Kong using the Hong Kong open-ended fund company structure (OFC) ...
Earlier this month, Elon Musk revealed that Tesla, the electric car company run by the world's richest person, had bought $1.5bn (£1.1bn) in bitcoin and might soon also accept payment in the popular but controversial cryptocurrency. News of Tesla’s investment boosted bitcoin, and while lately it dropped from its record high, it appears to be rebounding. Cryptocurrency investment continues to move into the mainstream as global interest rates remain at record lows ...
This week, Westlaw Today published an article by Dinsmore partner J.T. Wilson III about the generational shift in attitudes toward racial equity in light of George Floyd's death and about how business owners and employers must react accordingly ...
We wish to bring to your attention that the deadline for applying for foreign employee work permits for 2021 with the Ministry of Labour and Vocational Training (“MLVT”) is 31 March 2021. This obligation applies to every employer in Cambodia employing foreign employees, including representative offices, branches, private or public limited companies, non-governmental organizations and associations ...
New research from the CIPD has confirmed that LGBT+ employees experience higher level of work-based conflict, and almost one in five transgender workers feel psychologically unsafe at work. The CIPD’s recent report, Inclusion at work: perspectives on LGBT+ working lives confirms that while workplace inclusivity is fundamental to good, fair work and positive employee outcomes, many organisations have been slow to make headway to support their LGBT+ workforces ...
On 8 February 2021, The Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) published a consultation paper on (i) the proposed code of conduct on bookbuilding and placing activities in equity capital market (ECM) and debt capital market (DCM) transactions (Proposed Code) and (ii) the “sponsor coupling” proposal (together, the Proposals) ...
Is Wi-Fi sickness a disability? The California Court of Appeal just said it is in Brown v. Los Angeles Unified School District (2d Dist., Div. Eight), Case No. B294240. In a case that tests the limits of California’s liberal pleading standard, the appellate court green-lighted a claim of a woman who asserted a disability of “electromagnetic hypersensitivity,” or, as the concurring justice put it, “Wi-Fi sickness ...
This bulletin is on recent Philippine legal developments in data privacy, fintech and digital banks. PRIVACY UPDATE Caring about Sharing: New Rules on Data Sharing Agreements On December 23, 2020, the Philippine data privacy regulator, the National Privacy Commission (NPC) issued NPC Circular No. 2020-03 on data sharing agreements (2020 DSA Circular).1 The circular supersedes NPC Circular No ...
Bradley attorneys Aron Beezley and Nathaniel Greeson highlight the administrative bid protest landscape in New York given the state's abundant acquisition economy. New York state's budget is the second largest in the country, and with it, New York has some of the most developed state acquisition laws and procedures in the country. Accordingly, New York provides comparatively robust bid protest rights when it comes to state-level bid protests ...
As of March 11, 2020, the date on which the World Health Organization (WHO) declared COVID-19 a pandemic, States have taken various measures such as social distancing, restriction of free movement, the closure of borders, among others, which have undoubtedly had a decisive impact on people in general, and especially on workers and employers ...
The objective of open banking is to have a payments and markets infrastructure which provides customers with the ability to review all their banking and financial information seamlessly. Open banking will lead to a situation where regardless of how many accounts and financial products a customer has with multiple institutions, he can manage them from a centralised location without having to check out from one system to another ...
On February 15th, 2020, Law No.21,312 (hereinafter, the “Law”) was published in the Official Gazette, which extends the enforcement of the benefits and entitlements established in Title I of law No.21,227 (“Employment Protection Act”) and in Law No.21,263 (that temporarily amends the requirements to access and increases the amounts of the benefits of the unemployment insurance) and grants new provisions with charge to the unemployment mutual aid fund ...
The HKMA published a report titled “AML/CFT Regtech: Case Studies and Insights” highlighting the opportunities that Regtech offers to transform the effectiveness and efficiency of Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Financing of Terrorism (“AML/CFT”) efforts, and sharing end-to-end approaches which worked in real-life examples ...
The FSI has published the BIS’s research paper titled “Fintech regulation: how to achieve a level playing field” in February 2021 (the “Paper”). The Paper explores how regulation should evolve to encourage fair competition between traditional banks and new fintech and big tech players ...
ASIFMA, together with the Future of Sustainable Data Alliance, published a paper entitled “Data Challenges and Opportunities for ESG and Sustainable Finance in Asia Pacific” – a result of a year-long review of sustainability data challenges facing the industry in the Asia Pacific ...
As mentioned in our article published on 3 April 2020, the deadline for compliance with the Securities and Futures Commission’s (SFC’s) circular of 8 July 2019 on new measures to protect client assets (Circular) was extended to 31 January 2021. With these new measures in place, intermediaries are now required to obtain confirmation from authorised institutions (AIs) (i.e ...
On 23 December 2020, the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) updated its Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) relating to Open-ended Fund Companies (OFCs) on matters related to custodians and the custody of assets and records of the OFC. Appointment of multiple custodians Under the Securities and Futures Ordinance, all scheme property of an OFC must be entrusted to a custodian of the OFC for safekeeping ...
On 5 February 2021, financial authorities in Mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau, including the People’s Bank of China (PBOC), the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission (CBIRC), the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC), China’s State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE), Hong Kong’s Securities and Futures Commission (SFC), the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) and the Monetary Authority of Macau (AMCM), jointly signed a memorandum of understa
