The Supreme Court of India (“Supreme Court”), in its recent landmark judgment in In Re: Interplay between Arbitration Agreements under the Arbitration and Conciliation Act 1996 and the Indian Stamp Act 1899 (“the 7J Judgment”), provides welcome clarity on the question of enforceability of arbitration agreements contained in unstamped or inadequately stamped contracts, and reinforces…

The Indian arbitration bar was waiting for an important judgment of a 7-judge bench of the Indian Supreme Court (“Judgment”), which reviewed its own earlier judgment in NN Global Mercantile Private Limited v. Indo Unique Flame Ltd. and Ors. (“NN Global”) covered in a previous blog post here. The issue before the Indian Supreme Court…

As experienced negotiators know, the process of contract negotiation can give rise to fruitful and long-lasting business relationships. The parties may meet several times to develop the precise terms of their agreements, through videoconferences, in conference rooms, or over dinner and drinks. But for many contracts, the parties’ representatives never meet, limiting their negotiations to…

In an India-seated arbitration, if your contract is unstamped or insufficiently stamped, the Supreme Court of India has now confirmed in its authoritative judgement passed on April 25, 2023, in N N Global Mercantile Private Limited v. Indo Unique Flame Ltd. & Ors. (“NN Global”) that this would be a valid ground to disallow acting…

In many Arab countries, including Jordan, special legislative and regulatory instruments are in place to provide certain protections for local commercial agents and distributors. The relevant laws regularly vest the local courts with exclusive jurisdiction to rule on disputes between agents/distributors and principals. Such exclusive jurisdiction rules prevent derogation from the jurisdiction of local state courts…

On 30 July 2021, the PRC Ministry of Justice issued the Amendment to the Arbitration Law (Consultation Draft) (the “Draft Amendment”), which is the first substantial amendment of the existing PRC Arbitration Law (the “Arbitration Law”) in more than two decades. (See previous posts on the PRC Arbitration Law here and here.) Of the changes…

The Chinese Arbitration Act (1995) recognizes the principle of competence-competence in Article 20, under which a party challenging the validity of the arbitration agreement may request the relevant arbitration commission to make a decision or apply to the court for a ruling. Ultimately, though, it is the reviewing courts in PR China that shall have…

The doctrine of separability of arbitration agreements recognises that an arbitration clause contained in a broader agreement is separate and valid despite the invalidity of the rest of the agreement. The doctrine also raises a fundamental question: what is the governing law of the separable arbitration agreement as compared to the remainder of the contract…

Under China’s arbitration regime for foreign-related arbitration and international arbitration, the concept of a juridical seat is a statutory juncture where, in cases with no express agreement on the applicable law between the parties, Chinese courts must determine the applicable law (statutory text is available in Chinese here and unofficial English translation here).1) See Article…

Introduction In order to conclude an enforceable arbitration agreement, various validity conditions are required. The authority of the signatory agent to conclude an arbitration agreement on behalf of the principal is one of these requirements. In some jurisdictions, an explicit/specific authority is also required. An agent authorized with a general power of attorney, but without…

Latvian courts annually enforce approximately 1000 arbitral awards. Just a few years ago this number was even higher – reaching 7000 requests in 2004 (statistics of the Court Information System available here) – since also consumer disputes could have been submitted to arbitration, as non-negotiated arbitration clauses were not presumed to be unfair and thus…

By Nicholas Fletcher QC and Victoria Clark of Berwin Leighton Paisner LLP In the recent decision of Christian Kruppa v Alessandro Benedetti and Bertrand des Pallières [2014] EWHC 1887 (Comm), Mr Justice Cooke sitting in the English Commercial Court was asked to decide whether or not or a governing law and jurisdiction clause constituted an…

By Justin D’Agostino, Jessica Booth and Tracy Wu, Herbert Smith Freehills Ever since the internal fight between CIETAC (Beijing) and its Shanghai and Shenzhen sub-commissions became public in May 2012, the internal jurisdictional dispute between Beijing and the two sub-commissions has loomed large, resulting in the latter two declaring independence, re-naming themselves and introducing new…