LATEST ANALYSIS
January 2012
31 Jan 2012
In the wake of the Lunar New Year, another U.S.-listed Chinese company has sacked its auditor and reshuffled its board of directors. Longhai Steel, a wire producer based in the PRC…
31 Jan 2012
RuggedCom, an Ontario based company that provides Ethernet switches, network routers, wireless devices and servers for use in harsh environments, has found its white knight…
31 Jan 2012
With the disappearance of Canadian income trusts and the continued strength of Canadian real estate, REITs became the “go-to” investment for yield-hungry investors in 2011...
31 Jan 2012
HSBC’s recent debt derivative provides food for thought with a structured product tied to the performance of a number of Swiss companies including Nestle, the world’s largest food and nutrition company…
31 Jan 2012
With the annual reporting season just beginning for many SEC filers, independent public accountants of U.S.-listed Chinese companies are being extra careful in their disclosures this year…
31 Jan 2012
Little understood but with massive tax advantages – carried interest has catapulted to the front of the political agenda in the U.S. and throughout the world…
31 Jan 2012
April may be the cruelest month, as poet TS Eliot wrote, but the SEC has made January a calamitous month for a new batch of defendants. The Commission has filed no fewer than eight complaints or administrative proceedings so far in the new…
30 Jan 2012
Storm Resources has agreed to acquire fellow Calgary business Bellamont Exploration, in a deal valued at $82.6 million. Storm will also take on $40 million in net debt…
26 Jan 2012
Last year’s introduction of say-on-pay regulations via Dodd-Frank helped to arm shareholders with the capacity to disapprove compensation policies, but the SEC’s evolving compensation disclosure regulations and recent updates from proxy advisory firms’ guidelines indicate…
26 Jan 2012
The FSA may have trumped U.S. regulators recently for the title of most fearsome regulator, fining one unwary U.S. hedge fund manager for having violated UK market abuse rules…
26 Jan 2012
As a tool restricted to larger corporations, filings under Canada’s Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act tend to gain a lot of attention. Of late, that attention has intensified...
26 Jan 2012
An ongoing dispute between the Quinn Group, a company run by Ireland’s former richest man, and Anglo Irish Bank has highlighted the growing attraction of bankruptcy tourism in Europe – the practice of moving to another country for the purpose of…
26 Jan 2012
U.S. oil giant ConocoPhillips has been slapped with a heavy clean-up fine by the Chinese government. On January 25, China’s Ministry of Agriculture ordered CNOOC Ltd and…
26 Jan 2012
As the Financial Services Authority waits for the Supreme Court decision on the Lehman client money fiasco, it has finally put together PS12/2, a policy statement that will change the way that CASS 6.3 treats the liens that firms are permitted to agree to...
25 Jan 2012
State aid and quantitative easing, together with the existence of a large number of cross-border operations, reflect the need for global harmonised standards...
25 Jan 2012
Junior explorer Adriana Resources has closed a joint venture agreement with WISCO International Resources Development & Investment, one of the largest Chinese state-owned iron and steel companies…
24 Jan 2012
A fiscal tourniquet will put a squeeze on tax evasion – the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act is threatening to clog the arteries of the world’s financial system with U.S. withholding taxes and burdensome obligations on non-U.S. firms…
24 Jan 2012
With the promise of high yields, peer to peer lending is attracting record amounts from institutional investors and individual lenders alike, even in the face of a cloudy regulatory future…
24 Jan 2012
Over the past few years, global demand for food and certain natural resources, along with speculation, has impacted both the availability and pricing of certain commodities. It has also increased the amount of attention focused on commodities...
24 Jan 2012
The tax considerations involved in a business acquisition vary depending on the form of transaction and the types of entities involved. The structure of the transaction will affect the tax consequences arising from the deal…
24 Jan 2012
Stinging from regulatory policies restricting home purchases, mortgage grants and loan approvals, real estate developers in China are starting to band together. In late December…
24 Jan 2012
Cross-border UK M&A deals are showing signs of life, despite UK-based deals flat lining. Volition, a Singapore based life sciences company, recently filed details of its acquisition of the Belgian subsidiary of the UK’s ValiBio…
23 Jan 2012
The National Futures Association has begun accepting registration applications for swap dealers and major swap participants and launched...
23 Jan 2012
Dundee REIT has entered into an agreement to acquire all of the outstanding units of Whiterock REIT in a deal which values Whiterock’s equity at approximately $580 million…
18 Jan 2012
With less than a month left to file public commentary on the proposed Volcker rule, experts are warning the rules could hamper liquidity in the Australian market place...
18 Jan 2012
Business Law Currents takes a look at market conditions, regulatory regimes, M&A transactions and corporate finance activity to provide insight on possible deal making trends in 2012…
18 Jan 2012
Early indications are that 2012 might be as disastrous a year for stock market exchange mergers as the last. NYSE Euronext and Deutsche Börse’s $10.2 billion deal appears to have hit a snag, as regulatory barriers continue to put exchange mergers in jeopardy…
18 Jan 2012
In the face of ongoing interest in natural resources, cash-rich companies looking to make strategic investments and stock market volatility, Canada’s relatively robust M&A environment of the past year seems likely to continue...
18 Jan 2012
Calgary-based Vero Energy is moving out of the natural gas business with its agreement to sell certain natural gas assets to an unnamed private oil and gas company for $209 million…
18 Jan 2012
Investors have become increasingly wary of counterparty risk in the wake of MF Global’s collapse and continued Eurozone uncertainty. As a result, physical gold purchases have rocketed…
18 Jan 2012
Fiscal year-end disclosure differences between Cathay Pacific Airways and its affiliate, Air China, are making waves in Hong Kong, prompting auditors to speak up…
18 Jan 2012
As we approach annual meeting season, it is time to start thinking about the hot button issues that boards and senior management will face - and that may show up in proxy statements - in 2012...
18 Jan 2012
A China-focused SPAC is hitting up U.S. investors for cash. Pricing its shares at US$8 each, RNK Global Development Acquisition Corp is aiming to raise up to US$34.5 million…
17 Jan 2012
As Asia continues to play an instrumental role in the growth of the global financial services sector, local regulators will be placing more emphasis on governance principles to ensure accountability and effectiveness...
17 Jan 2012
Global capital markets faced a tough year in 2012, slipping to their worst performance in three years. Undoubtedly impacted by global developments, the question remains….
16 Jan 2012
The fabric of the financial services industry has started to change as firms seek to understand and comply with the regulatory response to the financial crisis. The wide-ranging new rules that cover everything from remuneration, proprietary trading and capital adequacy...
12 Jan 2012
In this two-part series, we provide an overview of the corporate governance and disclosure matters that companies should consider as they gear up for the 2012 annual meeting and reporting season…
12 Jan 2012
In today’s climate of economic uncertainty, deal parties are mitigating risk through escrows…
12 Jan 2012
Canadian corporate and securities laws often provide several means for the compulsory acquisition of minority shareholder stakes in an issuer. Because of that fact, minority shareholders are generally provided the right to dissent to such a transaction...
12 Jan 2012
Caveat investor: beware the risks of rehypothecation and what this means for your money. Part 2 of our rehypothecation series reveals what happens to assets rehypothecated in the UK and the slim chances of U.S. investors recovering their MF Global money from the UK…
12 Jan 2012
Bank credit rating downgrades are flowing through to deals, as Credit Suisse published supplemental prospectuses for various debt programmes impacted by its recent credit rating downgrade…
12 Jan 2012
A slow but steady hum of economic development in some Southeast Asian jurisdictions has begun to catch the attention of foreign investors. Searching for opportunities away from…
12 Jan 2012
Guide Exploration of Calgary has announced an agreement to acquire certain Northwestern Alberta properties from an unnamed senior Canadian oil and gas producer for $61.5 million…
12 Jan 2012
One offshore investment firm has been revving up its China-focused portfolio ahead of the Lunar New Year. Richburg Holdings, an investment firm based in the British Virgin…
12 Jan 2012
A recent double tax treaty between Luxembourg and Russia is opening up new legal structures for investment in the former communist country…
12 Jan 2012
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission approved four rules including one on protecting cleared swaps customer contracts and collateral that was mandated by the U.S. Dodd-Frank regulatory overhaul...
10 Jan 2012
2011 began with signs of real promise for increased M&A activity as deal volume picked up nicely in the first half of 2011, but economic uncertainty dampened transactional festivities as the North American and European markets declined…
10 Jan 2012
With companies gearing up for the 2012 annual meeting and reporting season, we have prepared a two-part overview of the corporate governance and disclosure matters that companies…
10 Jan 2012
No-contest settlements have become the focus of heated discussion over the past few months on both sides of the 49th parallel. Ironically, just as the use of such settlements by the SEC is under attack, Ontario’s regulator is considering implementing them…
10 Jan 2012
Internet companies that operate microblogs and other social media services in China are grappling with the implementation of new regulations by the Chinese government…
10 Jan 2012
The EU’s clampdown on tax havens continues unabated, as the European Commission squashes Gibraltar’s plans to attract offshore investment through the creation a hybrid tax regime in which offshore companies would pay substantially less tax than domestic companies…
10 Jan 2012
New SEC guidelines are due to shed light over the details of banks’ Eurozone exposure. Sparked by the bankruptcy of MF Global and ongoing fears over European sovereign debt, the guidelines require that…
10 Jan 2012
NASDAQ-listed GigaMedia is ready to make a comeback. On January 6, the company disclosed that its former chief executive officer and chairman, Lee Yichin…
6 Jan 2012
Consulting services firm Genivar has raised approximately $160 million in a private placement to two of Canada’s largest institutional investors – the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB) and the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec…
5 Jan 2012
Compliance professionals at investment advisers seeking guidance on social media use by their portfolio managers, traders and advisory representatives may have got rather more than they asked for from the Securities and Exchange Commission this week...
4 Jan 2012
Global regulators have been anything but idle in 2011. Predictably, the U.S. regulatory landscape was dominated by the 800-lb. statutory gorilla, the Dodd-Frank Act…
4 Jan 2012
In today’s uncertain economic environment, acquirers, targets and lawyers on both sides of the negotiation table are focusing on risk allocation via indemnification…
4 Jan 2012
2011 has been a challenging year for corporate executives and directors. In addition to enforcement, regulators around the world have placed additional resources into refining corporate governance regulations in a move to more closely scrutinize directors’ duties, bribery and executive remuneration…
4 Jan 2012
Despite sovereign debt concerns and continued worries about the global economy, many Canadian public issuers are still able to access debt financing. While financing may still be readily available, even the most stable borrowers are impacted by the regulatory and economic environment…
4 Jan 2012
Aquino Milling, a rice producer in the Philippines, recently filed for an initial public offering in the United States. Hoping to capitalize on production gaps left by…
3 Jan 2012
A leading tax decision of the English Court of Appeal clarified the treatment of monies paid between partners to conclude that profit distributions disguised as fee rebates will qualify as taxable and that rebates were not deductable as expenses of the partnership…
3 Jan 2012
Independent asset manager Dundee Corporation has elected to take Toronto’s Dundee Capital Markets private, in a deal which values the investment dealer at $174 million…
2 Jan 2012
Goldman Sachs' maiden foray into capital-raising utilising sharia-compliant mechanisms has understandably generated a lot of interest. However, as in the case of some other conventional banks before it, the market reception in certain quarters has been somewhat sceptical, mainly due to a misunderstanding surrounding the nature of the sukuk structure...