Pierre Denis, Étienne Brassard, Benjamin David Gross and Sibylle Ferreira, whose practices focus on business law, financing and aeronautics, contributed to the development of a Q&A guide entitled Aviation finance in Canada: overview and published in the first edition of Practical Law’s Aviation Finance Global Guide ...
Timeline 20 August 2013: The South African National Assembly passes the Protection of Personal Information Bill [B9D of 2009] (“the Bill”) to give effect to the constitutional right to privacy. 19 November 2013: The Bill is signed into law by President Jacob Zuma and gazetted as the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 (“POPI”) ...
On 21 July 2016, National Treasury released the third draft of the regulations under the Financial Markets Act, 2012 (the “Third Draft Regulations”). The previous draft of the regulations was released in June 2015. The Third Draft Regulations are, together with pending legislation, aimed at progressing the financial sector reform strategy for South Africa ...
The decision by the International Trademark Association (“INTA”) to host a major meeting in Cape Town – apparently the first INTA conference to take place on African soil – is highly significant. It certainly says a great deal about the continent's growing economic importance. The conference takes place on 1 – 2 September 2016 and it’s entitled “Building Africa with Brands” ...
Implementation of Prakas on minimum registered capital of banking and financial institutions,Circular № B7-016-117 C.L, dated 16 June 2016This Circular, issued on 16 June 2016, aims at implementing Prakas №B7-016-117 on Minimum Registered Capital of Banking and Financial Institutions (“BFIs”), dated 22 March 2016 (“Prakas №B7-016-117”), in relation to procedures for increasing the minimum registered capital requirements of BFIs ...
Media outlets have recently been reporting on the possibility that Nikola Tesla Airport will acquire Sava Centar (SC), with the purpose of turning it into its company headquarters. This acquisition would be followed by an investment of over EUR 30 million in the next three years for the building's reconstruction and adaptation ...
On 11 July 2016, The National Bank of Serbia adopted amendments to three by-laws of the Law on Banks (Risk Management Decision, Decision on the Classification of Bank Balance Sheet Assets and Off-balance Sheet Items and the Decision on Reporting Requirements for Banks), and in doing so, took a significant step towards effectuating the implementation of the strategies on resolving non-performing loans and the action plan rendered by the Government of the Republic of Serbia and the Nation
Latest news reports from the airline industry show that the European Commission has ended their investigation into the ownership structure of "Air Serbia", reaching a conclusion that Serbia indeed holds management rights over its national air carrier. Furthermore, having in mind their minority stake in Air Serbia, Etihad Airways has thus been enabled to operate according to EU standards in Serbia ...
Two recent high-profile cases involving popular songs have placed the spotlight on copyright issues. In the first of these, in California, a Los Angeles jury has decided that Led Zeppelin’s 1971 rock classic Stairway to Heaven did not infringe the copyright in a 1967 song called Spirit by the band Taurus. The case centred on the opening chord sequence in Stairway to Heaven, which the jury concluded was not “intrinsically similar” to the sequence in Spirit ...
On Monday, 11 July 2016, the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (“JSE”) launched a T+3 settlement cycle. This is in line with international best practice and moves away from the previous standard T+5 settlement cycle. The result is that settlement, payment and funds release in respect of securities trades will be done in a total of four days, as opposed to six days (as was previously the case). The move is the culmination of a project initiated by the JSE in 2013 ...
A recent European trade mark decision highlights how risky it can be to simply register the word version of a trade mark that is used in a stylised form. The case also highlights an issue that may be worthwhile considering when creating a trade mark – simpler may be cheaper. The decision in question involved a European registration for the trade mark Aunt Bessie’s in ordinary script for a range of foodstuffs ...
Last June 8, Carlos J. Leitão, the Minister responsible for Government Administration and Ongoing Program Review and Chair of the Conseil du trésor, tabled Bill 108, An Act to facilitate oversight of public bodies' contracts and to establish the Autorité des marchés publics ...
Amendments to Russian Civil Code on different types of interest under Articles 317.1 and 395Dear Sir or Madam,We would like to inform you that on July 5, 2016 the President of the Russian Federation signed Federal Law dated 03.07.2016 No. 315 “On Amendments to Part I of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation and certain Legislative Acts of the Russian Federation” (hereinafter referred to as the “Law”), which comes into force from August 01, 2016 ...
Extension of Deadline for Online Company Re-Registration, Notification № 2338 (Ministry of Commerce) 01 July 2016According to Prakas 300, dated 29 December 2015, all companies, branches, and representative offices registered in Cambodia wererequired to complete a re-registration process through the Ministry of Commerce’s online registration portal which was launched in January 2016.The deadline for completing the re-registration process was previously extended from March to 30 June 2016 ...
Banking and FinanceMEMBERSHIP OF FAST AND CENTRAL SHARED SWITCH SYSTEMS, Prakas № B14-016-147 Pror Kor, dated 19 May 2016This Prakas, effective from 19 May 2016, requires banking and financial institutions to become members of FAST and Central Shared Switch systems. It aims at encouraging an easy, quick, effective, secure and reliable retail payment in order to foster the development of banking and financial sectors and the national economy ...
Patricia Gannon, Senior Partner, and Rastko Petaković, Partner, together with Associates Veton Qoku and Nevena Tomić Lučić, attended the Balkan Legal Forum ( BLF) 2016 – a conference organised by the IBA European Regional Forum and the Legal Development Foundation ...
Clients with European Union (“EU”) trade marks, registered designs and EP patents may be wondering what will happen to their IP protection in the United Kingdom (“UK”) now that the nation has voted to leave the EU.The good news is that EU IP rights extending to the UK will not be affected in the short-term. The European Patent Office is not an EU institution, so the leave vote will have no effect on EP patents ...
One of the significant issues in the past has been that most international banks have not conducted direct banking transactions with Myanmar banks. This was at least partially due to Myanmar being on an international black list that discourages banks from countries that are a “member” from transacting business with banks from countries on the list ...
The venture capital industry has one goal: making startups incredibly lucrative and, thus, maximizing returns to venture capital investors. For the venture capital investor these outstanding returns are generally materialized 5 or 6 years after the Series A investment round, when the investor makes an exit and the startup either performs an initial public offering of its shares (IPO) or is sold to a strategic acquirer or a private equity fund ...
