The Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS) has announced various reforms to the voluntary Prompt Payment Code to tackle the ongoing issue of late payments. The Government announced its plans to reform the Code following its call for evidence on how to create a responsible payment culture for small businesses. The key changes to the Code are: … Read more

The Law Society’s Company Law Committee has published a Q&A on how to use electronic signatures and complete virtual executions. Whilst the Q&A is not a comprehensive statement of law, it is intended to assist with some of the practicalities of using an electronic signature in England and Wales. The Q&A focuses on the use of electronic … Read more

The end of 2021 has been the date set in stone for the discontinuation of LIBOR for some time. Legacy transactions using sterling and other non-USD LIBOR rates will need to be amended this year as part of the active transition away from the use of LIBOR. Our finance team has published a briefing which looks at the … Read more

The Supreme Court has handed down judgment in the Covid-19 Business Interruption insurance test case of The Financial Conduct Authority v Arch and Others. It unanimously dismissed the appeals by the insurers and allowed all four of the appeals by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), in two cases on a qualified basis. The proceedings were brought … Read more

The Investment Association (IA) has published a document discussing its listed company shareholder priorities for 2021. The IA first published its shareholder priorities in January 2020. It focused on four key areas: climate change, audit quality, stakeholder engagement and employee voice and diversity (see our earlier blog post). The 2021 priorities document provides insights into the … Read more

ICSA: The Chartered Governance Institute has published its Final Report on the effectiveness of independent board evaluation. It has concluded that there is scope for broader adoption of existing good practice in the way some external reviews are conducted and greater transparency about the process that was followed. The Government asked ICSA to assess the quality of … Read more

This Covid-19 update briefing contains a summary of changes in corporate law and regulation made in the course of last year in connection with Covid-19. Please click here to see the briefing. Read more

We have published our half-yearly update briefing which summarises the major developments in UK corporate law and regulation that have occurred over the last six months, that is from July to December 2020, and which are of relevance to UK listed companies. The briefing is available here. Read more