Rail firms have announced proposals to close hundreds of ticket offices across England and Wales over the next three years, potentially creating redundancy situations. Could the offer of alternative roles provide a way of avoiding redundancy dismissals? When does a redundancy situation arise and what obligations does an employer have? Redundancy is one of a limited number of potentially fair reasons for which an employer can dismiss an employee ...
West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals makes clear that third parties may not sue under the West Virginia Consumer Credit and Protection Act for collection attempts On May 17, 2017, the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals issued a unanimous decision that affirmed a trial court’s order granting summary judgment to a collector in a lawsuit brought by a third party over collection calls made to her home that were intended to reach another person living there. In Young v ...
When the Supreme Court in 2020 issued its decision in Liu v. SEC, placing limits upon the Securities and Exchange Commission's ability to obtain disgorgement, many observers believed that the decision would significantly diminish the SEC's capability to seek and obtain significant disgorgement recoveries in civil enforcement actions alleging violations of the securities laws ...
Twenty months in, Covid-19 continues to demand that we exercise flexibility and adaptation as it identifies winners and losers. The pandemic has had a significant impact on the practice of law and businesses that are involved in, or contemplating, litigation. Those who have been involved in litigation know that it can be expensive in “normal” times. Here are three ways the pandemic has impacted the costs associated with litigation. Time to trial ...
As seen in Bank Director Strategic planning is one of the most important roles of a financial institution’s board of directors. Since the 2008 financial crisis, financial institution boards have dealt with the emergence of fintechs as a primary consideration in developing their strategic plans ...
Three recent Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (“FCPA”) enforcement actions underscore the Department of Justice (“DOJ”) and the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (“SEC”) focus on prosecuting companies and individuals for improper gifts, meals, travel, and entertainment provided to foreign officials. Avon Products, Inc ...
Congress reached agreement on the third round of coronavirus-related relief measures (totaling approximately $900 Billion) as this issue was being written. The relevant statutory language is part of the massive Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021 (the “Act”) and was released on December 21, 2020. Passage by the House and Senate was swift, and approval by the President is expected ...
as published in the Fall 2021 issue of West Virginia Banker magazine As the world (hopefully) comes out of the COVID-19 pandemic later this year, the way we conduct business is changing. The banking industry, described by one commentator as “the most old-school of the old-school professions,” is criticized as being resistant to change. As one article described it, “the fundamental ways that financial institutions function have not changed with the times ...
The world continues to come to grips with the daily changes brought by the COVID-19 pandemic. Schools contemplate opening. Some do, while others do not. Some professional and college sports teams play games to empty stadiums. Some businesses are open, with restrictions, while others are not. Lawsuits are being filed by businesses that think they should be permitted to reopen like their neighbors who already have ...
Lauren Bowkett is a fraud and financial crime expert in the Business Crime and Compliance Team at Shoosmiths. She is an expert in confiscation proceedings under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 (‘POCA’) and has successfully intervened in numerous POCA cases to assert her clients third party interest rights ...
Most employers know that they have a legal obligation to protect employees from harassment at work and to prevent it from recurring. Many employers assume that this obligation relates to harassment by employees and managers; however, it actually extends to harassment by third parties, including customers or vendors. Several recent cases brought by the U.S ...
One of the common complaints that commercial entities have about international arbitration in Thailand is the costs. Whilst in the past, international arbitration has been promoted as being cheaper than court litigation, in practice this has not always been the case, particularly in the case of complex commercial disputes or investor state arbitration. Third party funding can dramatically change this landscape ...
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 ...
An important, and often overlooked, arrow in the quiver of any company defending itself against potentially devastating class litigation is the implicit requirement of “ascertainability.” Before a class can be certified, a plaintiff must demonstrate by a preponderance of the evidence that the members of the class are currently and readily identifiable based on objective criteria ...
Most commentary around AI looks at the big picture or the future of work, but in this article we look at some practical data protection implications for businesses that are considering implementing AI systems. 1. Automated Decision-Making There are specific rules in both the EU and UK GDPR (in this article we will refer to both together) covering individuals’ rights when processing involves solely automated decision-making, including profiling ...
The past two years have seen significant growth in the number of mergers and acquisitions nationwide with many agriculture and farming business owners choosing to liquefy their assets and move on. At the same time, employers have had to cope with numerous challenges that have made the task of hiring and preparing I-9s for new employees more difficult. Some employers (unlawfully) stopped preparing I-9s for new hires altogether ...
At Spilman Thomas & Battle, we talk with lending clients regularly about their collection options against borrowers who have defaulted in their obligations. Many are surprised to learn how varied and wide their toolbox actually is. Debts that look dead in the water may yet have air in the lungs ...
As the COVID-19 pandemic has evolved, and as we noted in our prior blog post regardingvirtual annual meetings, both ISS and Glass Lewis have issued guidance on virtual meetings and annual meeting best practices in response to COVID-19. Pivoting from its focus on annual meetings, Glass Lewis has issued anew releasethat highlights certain key governance areas that they will be paying close attention to in the coming months ...
Decree-Law 30-A/2022was published on 18 April to approve the exceptional measures intended to ensure the simplification of the procedures for producing energy from renewable sources. These measures came into force on 19 April and will be in force for a period of 2 years. These exceptional measures have been published by the Government in the current macroeconomic and geopolitical situation ...
Court decisions regarding company names are rare. So the recent decision of the Western Cape High Court in the case of Bloomberg’s Posterity Investments (Pty) Ltd v The Registrar of Companies and Bloomberg LLP is worth discussing. What makes company name cases interesting from an intellectual property (IP) law point of view is that they deal with issues that are very similar to the issues that are dealt with in trade mark infringement and passing-off cases ...
Luc Thibaudeau Lavery keeps a close eye on developments in consumer law. Its leading-edge expertise in the retail trade and class action has been pointed out many times by people involved in the field. Lavery is committed to keeping the business community informed about the issue by regularly publishing bulletins dealing with case law and legislative developments that could affect, influence and even change business practices ...
What happened? Two directors of VTL, a Jersey company, devised a fraudulent scheme. They purported to provide investors with a mechanism to decrease income tax exposure. As it turned out, the scheme was a fraud on the customers. It was also a fraud on VTL: instead of turning over around £4.55 million in proceeds from the scheme to VTL, the directors kept these funds for themselves ...
On March 28, 2020, the Act on Measures in Corporate, Cooperative, Association, Foundation, and Home Ownership Law to Combat the Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic (COVID-19 Act) entered into effect. Among other things, the COVID-19 Act provides for substantial facilitations for stock corporations to hold general meetings. The most important innovation for use in practice is the possibility of holding general meetings entirely virtually, i.e ...
Looking back on 2022, what were some of the major events/trends that impacted the work you did as an offshore law firm? Do you see these impacts being felt going into 2023? Anthony McKenzie (AM): 2021 was a blockbuster year for many offshore law firms in Asia. Booming deal flow saw revenues and profits surge. In order to service their clients, law firms increased their headcount. Fast forward to 2022 and beyond and the economic outlook is very different ...
