An English Court of Appeal case heard recently confirmed that the English courts will be unwilling to infer a common law duty into non-advisory contracts between banks and private individuals, by virtue of the Conduct of Business (“COB”) rules issued by the Financial Conduct Authority. This mirrors and reinforces the approach taken by the Hong … Read more

The US Federal Judicial Conference’s Advisory Committee on Civil Rules (the “Advisory Committee”) has proposed a series of amendments to the US Federal Rules of Civil Procedure—the rules that govern the conduct of civil proceedings in the US federal district courts. Among other issues, the amendments are intended to address and provide for proportionality in … Read more

In general, when someone dies their Will (assuming it is valid) is the final arbiter of where that person’s money and other property go.  However, statutes in both England and Hong Kong (and other similar jurisdictions) introduced an important exception to this general rule: those being immediately maintained before the death of the testator could … Read more

A number of our recent blog posts have looked at Hong Kong estates disputes.  The case of Ho Sin Ying v Chan Yui Ling and Maryo Development Limited (HCA 1531/2012) is another such dispute, but it has a couple of unusual twists.  Rather than an argument over a Will or the administration of the estate, … Read more

A proposed beneficiary under a Will loses out because a solicitor fails to prepare that Will.  Can that beneficiary make a claim against the solicitor?  There is no contract between the potential beneficiary and the solicitor, so ordinarily there will be no claim for breach of contract.  The question then is whether the solicitor could … Read more

The English High Court has held that a claimant had a good arguable case that a contract was made in both England and Texas and that this was sufficient to come within the relevant gateway for seeking permission to serve out of the jurisdiction, namely that the contract was made within the jurisdiction: Conductive Inkjet … Read more

The West Jakarta District Court ruled recently that an Indonesian law governed loan agreement between an Indonesian borrower and a foreign lender was void because it was written in English rather than Bahasa Indonesia and it was, therefore, in violation of Indonesia’s Law No. 24 of 2009 concerning Flag, Language and Symbol of State and … Read more

The long-running dispute between Astro, a Malaysian media giant, and Lippo, an Indonesian conglomerate, has reached the end of the latest heavily contested battle by Lippo against the enforcement of arbitral awards given in Astro’s favor. In PT First Media TBK v Astro Nusantara International BV & others [2013] SGCA 47, the Singapore Court of … Read more