COVID-19 has been affecting life and businesses around the globe. The developments over the last few days have been moving fast: the World Health Organisation declared the disease as pandemic, the US has restricted travel from certain countries and many countries are on either lockdown or self-isolation rules. A key and primary focus of businesses … Read more
In Hong Ziyun v Chan Kwan Ming [2019] HKCFI 2125, the Court of First Instance considered the relevant jurisdiction applicable to a host of related loan documents where only one of the documents contained an express jurisdiction clause (in favour of the court of Xiamen in Mainland China). The defendants applied for a stay of … Read more
The English High Court in Lehman Brothers International (Europe) (In Administration) v Exotix Partners LLP [2019] EWHC 2380 (Ch) found it necessary to imply a term to a debt security trade agreement that was otherwise unworkable. It is generally uncommon for a Court to imply terms into a commercially negotiated agreement given the restrictive nature of … Read more
In an important recent decision (FSHC Group Holdings Ltd v GLAS Trust Corporation Ltd [2019] EWCA Civ 1361), the English Court of Appeal confirmed that the test for rectifying a contractual document on the grounds of common mistake is a subjective one – clarifying the previous uncertain state of the law on this point. The court confirmed … Read more
Click here for a sneak preview With the launch of this new Guide, our market-leading litigation team has wrapped up a three-year project during which it produced eight issues of the Contract Disputes Practical Guide series for Hong Kong, an initiative that has been hugely popular with clients in the territory. We have also … Read more
The Hong Kong Court of First Instance has recently handed down its judgment in Shine Grace Investment Ltd v. Citibank, N.A. and Another (HCCL 28/2008), a case relating to alleged mis-selling of equity accumulator contracts by Citibank. In dismissing the plaintiff’s claim, Mr Justice Peter Ng applied the Hong Kong Court of Appeal’s (CA’s) reasoning … Read more
Parties to commercial contracts often insert a “no oral modification” (or NOM) clause to prevent attempts to undermine written agreements by informal means. Such clauses are intended to prevent contracting parties being bound by subsequent variations unless the specified formalities (for example, it is fairly typical in commercial contracts that a variation must be recorded … Read more
We discussed aspects of “Wrotham Park damages” (also called “license fee damages” or “negotiating damages”) in Herbert Smith Freehills Hong Kong office’s recent Contract Disputes Seminar “Getting your just deserts: remedies for breach of contract”. To recap, in some cases where there has been a breach of contract, instead of awarding damages calculated on the … Read more
The Hong Kong Court of Appeal (CA) has recently affirmed a decision of the Court of First Instance (CFI), in which a ruling was made in favour of the plaintiff investors in a mis-selling claim against a bank, albeit on different grounds to that of the CFI (click here for the full judgment and here … Read more
