This is a question we often find clients asking. For many business founders and entrepreneurs the step of recruiting a senior non customer facing individual represents a huge move. Our advice is almost always to get on; take the plunge and make that investment. Looking at the key objections that are often raised: Why do I need a score keeper? Any finance function has a role to play in reporting the past and in identifying areas for improvement ...
Amendments to the Corporate Income Tax Act which went into effect on 1 January 2014 provide an opportunity to revive the practice of subparticipation in lending in Poland. Regulations governing subparticipation have been in force since 2004. For tax reasons, however, subparticipation has remained much less popular in Poland than assignment of receivables, despite certain other advantages, particularly the greater ease of selling participation in loans backed by mortgages ...
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (“CFPB”) announced today that it would allow financial institutions to provide their privacy notices to consumers online and would no longer require annual distribution of paper copies, provided that the institutions meet certain requirements. Among other things, companies that rely on this new exemption (1) must not share data in ways that would trigger consumers’ opt-out rights (e.g ...
On September 8, the Canadian Department of Finance announced the signature of a memorandum of agreement (the "Agreement") between the provinces of British Columbia, Ontario, Saskatchewan and New Brunswick, and the federal government (the "Participating Jurisdictions") formalizing the terms and conditions of the Cooperative Capital Markets Regulatory System (the "Cooperative System"), a project to set up a national regulator for the Canadian securities industry ...
The Superior Court considered two interesting issues in the case of Banque Laurentienne du Canada v. Yuan.1 First, it had to determine whether a term loan that was used to payout an existing term loan had resulted in the novation of the first debt. Second, it had to determine what the effect the contract titled (translation) “Credit Facility Secured by Hypothec”2 had on the survival of the disputed hypothec.FACTSThe Court’s decision describes the circumstances of the dispute ...
Earlier this week, on September 29, 2014, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (“CFPB”) took action against Michigan-based Flagstar Bank, fining it $10 million and ordering $27.5 million in payments to consumers. Flagstar allegedly “took excessive time to process borrowers’ applications for foreclosure relief, failed to tell borrowers when their applications were incomplete, denied loan modifications to qualified borrowers, and illegally delayed finalizing permanent loan modifications ...
The Competition Commission of India (CCI) has conducted India’s first dawn raid. The CCI raided offices of UK-based construction equipment maker JCB, earlier today, in connection with a case of abuse of a dominant position. The Indian Competition Act (Act) accords power to the Director General (DG) to conduct such raids after obtaining a warrant from the chief metropolitan magistrate ...
The Draft Report of the Competition Policy Review released yesterday aims to set the pathway for resuscitating productivity growth in Australia, shining a light on areas of the economy in need of reform. It focuses on what is needed to promote productivity enhancing choice, diversity and innovation and focussing on areas such as health, planning laws, power and road transport. The Draft Report recommends changes to key competition laws that apply to all Australian businesses ...
On August 26, 2014, Judge Robert D. Drain of the Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York issued a bench ruling in In re MPM Silicones, LLC, Case No. 14-22503 (RDD), on several aspects of the plan of reorganization filed by debtor Momentive Performance Materials, Inc., a specialty chemicals manufacturing company, and its affiliated debtors ...
The Ministry of Finance announced that an improvement in the online inquiry concerning the value of declared merchandises intends to reduce under-declaration in 20%. For the purpose of establishing better controls on imported merchandises, the National Service of Customs of the Ministry of Finance has intensified and integrated software tools to apply in a more efficient and effective manner instruments of control over the value declared for the entry and exit of goods ...
On September 19, 2014, the Supreme Court of Canada issued its ruling in the so called “banks’ cases”1, in the context of which consumers instituted class actions to recover the conversion fees charged on credit card transactions in foreign currencies by many institutions issuing such cards. The plaintiffs were maintaining that these charges were contravening the Consumer Protection Act (Quebec) (the “CPA”) ...
It is a long held truth that businesses require more growth finance in times of economic recovery. Given the state of the economy on both a national and local level, now is the time to help Midlands based business owners and entrepreneurs. Recent figures from the British Bankers’ Association show that small businesses experienced a reduction in net lending in the first quarter this year, with repayments of existing debt exceeding new lending by £300 million ...
The Central Bank of Ireland has today issued its feedback statement on Consultation Paper 85 dealing with loan originating qualifying investor alternative investment funds (QIAIFs). In the feedback statement the Central Bank has announced that it will allow for the authorisation of QIAIFs that originate loans from 1 October 2014. The Central Bank's AIF Rulebook is being updated to reflect this change ...
In the last week, the Securities and Exchange Commission has announced charges in two separate investigations related to its “Broken Windows” initiative, signaling that the Commission’s focus on what some may characterize as “minor violations” will continue ...
Last month, the North Carolina Supreme Court issued an important opinion for lenders in this state. The opinion reversed the North Carolina Court of Appeals’ decision in RL REGI N.C., LLC v. Lighthouse Cove, LLC, which found that a waiver of claims contained in a forbearance agreement could not waive a guarantor’s affirmative defense that a guaranty was obtained in violation of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA). The Lighthouse Cove case involves a familiar story for many lenders ...
Two top officials of the U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division have spoken publicly in the last week about corporate compliance programs. Brent Snyder, Deputy Assistant Attorney General for criminal enforcement entitled his remarks to the International Chamber of Commerce in New York as “Compliance is a Culture, Not Just a Policy ...
On August 15, 2014, the Eleventh Circuit entered a Memorandum Opinion in the Wortley v. Chrispus Venture Capital, LLC case (In re Global Energies, LLC, “Global”)1 unwinding a section 363 sale order entered in 2010 by the Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Florida based on a finding of bad faith in the filing of an involuntary bankruptcy case in 2010 ...
GST/QST Election: Get Ready for 2015 Carolyne Corbeil and Emmanuel SalaGenerally, certain corporations or partnerships within a same group who are engaged exclusively in commercial activities, may make intra-group supplies of taxable goods or services without having to collect or remit the GST/QST otherwise applicable to such supplies ...
Yesterday, the SEC announced that it had levied charges against (i) 28 officers, directors and major shareholders of public companies for failing to file timely reports regarding their holdings and transactions in their respective companies’ equity securities and (ii) six public companies for contributing to filing failures by their insiders or failing to report their insiders’ filing delinquencies. Emphasizing the importance of filing ownership reports in a timely manner, Andrew J ...
On September 9, 2014, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (the “CFTC”) issued CFTC Letter No. 14-116 (the “CFTC Letter”) providing exemptive relief allowing commodity pools to use general solicitation in certain types of private offerings, including offerings of private fund interests. The CFTC Letter is available here ...
On 25 June 2014 the European Commission announced adoption of the Commission Communication “Notice on agreements of minor importance which do not appreciably restrict competition under Article 101(1) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (De Minimis Notice).” The De Minimis Notice was published in the Official Journal on 30 August 2014 (OJ C 291/1). The De Minimis Notice follows the existing practice of the Commission and the case law of the European Court of Justice ...
On September 3, 2014, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit entered an opinion vacating various orders of the United States Bankruptcy Court and District Court for the Southern District of Texas (the “Bankruptcy Court” and the “District Court”) in the bankruptcy cases of TMT Procurement Corporation and its affiliated debtors (the “Debtors”), including a final order approving the Debtors’ post-petition debtor in possession financing (the “DI
Vice Chancellor Laster of the Delaware Court of Chancery recently applied the business judgment standard of review at the pleading stage to dismiss a complaint challenging a cash-out merger involving a controlling stockholder. This is one of the first decisions applying the Delaware Supreme Court’s recent decision in Kahn v. M&F Worldwide Corp ...
The Texas Supreme Court denied a petition for review stemming from the Houston Court of Appeals’Barzoukas v. Found. Design, Ltd. decision.1 The case is significant because of its application of the economic loss rule (under Texas law) in the context of an owner-subcontractor dispute ...
PLMJ has launched the new version of its Portugal Investment Guide, which reflects PLMJ’s experience in handling innumerable investment projects in Portugal in a range of sectors, throughout its 45-year history.This Investment Guide proves that Portugal has increasingly competitive conditions – in terms of technology, workforce, infrastructure, logistics, geography, law and tax – to continue to attract large-scale investment projects ...
