Hong Kong is about to establish a unified insurance regulatory regime under the auspices of a new body, to be named the ‘Insurance Authority’. The creation and set up of an independent insurance authority is regarded by the Hong Kong Government as the most important regulatory reform in the insurance sector since the passage of … Read more

After almost four years of debate, the European Commission, Parliament and Council have finally reached political agreement on the proposed General Data Protection Regulation (the "GDPR"). The final text of the GDPR will now need to be formally approved by the European Parliament and the Council at the beginning of 2016. There will then be … Read more

Following high-level meetings in September which set the objective of strengthening bilateral regulatory, supervisory and law enforcement co-operation, the US Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) and the China Anti-Money Laundering Monitoring and Analysis Center (CAMLMAC) have entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that will result in additional levels of co-operation between the two Financial … Read more

Geoff Maddock, partner Email | Profile tel: +44 20 7466 2067 mobile: +44 7785 255016 By Geoff Maddock, corporate insurance partner and Jonathan Goodliffe, solicitor The Joint Committee of the European Supervisory Authorities has published an updated list of groups identified as financial conglomerates as at 31 December 2014. What is a financial conglomerate? Read more

On 23 November 2015, Russian President signed Edict No. 567 (the "Edict") suspending certain sanctions previously imposed by Russia on Iran in furtherance of the UN Security Council Resolutions. Read more

Germany’s recently enacted “Law for the fight against corruption” (the “New Law“[1]) has intensified the fight against corruption by broadening in multiple ways the scope of German anti-corruption legislation.  The New Law implements various legal acts of the Council of Europe and of the European Union, some of which date back as far as 1999[2]. … Read more

With effect from 13 November 2015, the Securities and Futures Ordinance (SFO) was amended to give new powers to the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) to provide supervisory assistance to overseas regulators. The SFC now has the power to compel licensed corporations (LCs) to produce records and documents or provide answers upon the request of … Read more

The recent case management decision in Harlequin Property (SVG) Ltd and Another v Wilkins Kennedy [2015] EWHC 3050 (TCC) considered an application by the Defendant to withhold documents from inspection on the basis of confidentiality. The documents in question fell into two categories, namely: (i) documents created in the course of an investigation into the … Read more