Adoption of the EU Council Directive on Tax Dispute Resolution Mechanisms in the European Union on 10 October 2017 is a milestone in international tax dispute resolution. The Directive offers a uniform mechanism to address tax treaty disputes among EU member states that meets the BEPS Action 14 minimum standard, and largely renders the arbitration option in…
In June 2017, the Fourth European Anti-Money Laundering Directive (the “Fourth EU Directive” (EU) 2015/849) was transposed into German law. The regime was further tightened, its scope was extended and new features, such as the transparency register, were introduced. With the fifth European Anti-Money Laundering Directive already on the horizon, more changes are to come….
A. Introduction Investments in a foreign country entail risks for the investors. These include the possibility that their investments will be nationalized or expropriated if, for example, a political change occurs. There is also a risk of loss as a result of war, armed conflict, revolution, a state of national emergency, etc. However, on 29…
The development of effective instruments for collective redress is a widely discussed topic among European politicians, consumer protectors, legal scholars and dispute resolution lawyers. The professional discourse was recently fuelled by the Volkswagen emission scandal (also referred to as “emissiongate” or “dieselgate”), which, at least in the US, was already subject to collective actions. Another…
After the US election, it was a certainty that in my inbox every morning there was at least one, if not more, email with a discussion on the future of arbitration in our changing society today. And this debate has continued in halls of university law schools to GAR events to law firm seminars. I…
The long-yearned for reform of the Arbitration Act has finally gotten off the starting block. An ad hoc commission has submitted its reform proposal (Proposal), to the scrutiny of the Ministry of Justice (for the full text of the Proposal see here; see also Guido Alpa et al., Un progetto di riforma delle ADR, Jovene,…
On 15 September 2017, the Chairman of the Administrative Council of the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) designated new members to the Panel of Arbitrators and the Panel of Conciliators. This is momentous. For the first time, the lists contain an equal number of female and male members, and a geographical diversity…
Last year I posted on the New Zealand High Court’s decision in Ngāti Hurungaterangi & Ors v Ngāti Wahiao [2016] NZHC 1486. The High Court rejected the plaintiffs’ claim that an arbitral award was inadequately reasoned and should be set aside. The Court described the panel’s reasoning as “undeniably sparse” but held by a “fine…
On 20th November 2017, the II Oxford Symposium on Comparative International Commercial Arbitration will take place at Wolfson College – University of Oxford. This conference brings together specialists from the Americas and Europe to discuss key issues in international commercial arbitration from a comparative perspective. This year we again have a particularly strong set of…
Cryptocurrency is a term that is becoming increasingly familiar. But how many of us have considered its implications for the world we live in—let alone for the practice of international arbitration? Cryptocurrencies—essentially digital cash—and the blockchain technology on which they are built, have the potential to revolutionise the way funds are raised, traded and stored….
Argentina’s Arbitration Legal Reform: Steps in the Right Direction? Argentina is arguably one of the countries with the most untapped economic potential worldwide. Argentina’s government, led by President Mauricio Macri, is trying to change that. Together with undertaking economic and political reforms aiming at stimulating private investment, the Argentine government is pushing for an exhaustive…
The international economic order is today bound together through a network of bilateral (and multilateral) investment treaties which provide investors with a variety of protections. Such Bilateral investment treaties (“BITs”) are a relatively young species dating back to 1959’s Pakistan-Federal Republic of Germany BIT. While the exact content of BITs varies by agreement, most contain…
This post is the conclusion of a two-part publication regarding the situation of investors in Ecuador vis-á-vis the country’s efforts to elude the substantive and procedural protections afforded by investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS). The first part consisted of a review of the law applicable to entering and withdrawing from the International Centre for Settlement of…
Overview In 2015, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Victoria highlighted the importance of positioning Australia as one of the next significant regional commercial hubs. Her Honour reiterated this position in a 2017 speech. Interestingly, similar, yet more subtle, comments were featured in a speech in 2009. Other Australian courts have made similar…
A recently released study on technology sector dispute resolution highlights significant distinctions in the sector’s perceptions of US domestic and international arbitration. The study conducted by the Silicon Valley Arbitration & Mediation Center (SVAMC), a non-profit educational foundation based in Palo Alto, California, was directed to understanding technology sector views regarding litigation and arbitration. The…
White & Case LLP and the School of International Arbitration at Queen Mary University of London (QMUL) are partnering once again to carry out cutting-edge empirical research in the field of international arbitration, with the launch of the 2018 International Arbitration Survey. International arbitration is the natural choice for resolving business disputes because it is…
When ABBA launched “The Winner Takes It All” in 1980, modern arbitration was still in its infancy. The ICC case numbers were just about to become four-digit, while the cases administered by ICSID could still be counted on two hands. Yet already at that time, “The Winner Takes It All” exemplified one of the two…
Volume 34, Issue 5 contains: Anthony C. Sinclair & Epaminontas E. Triantafilou, Specific Performance Under Commercial Contracts with Sovereign States Abstract: Awarding specific performance against a state is widely considered an affront to principles of sovereignty and non-interference. Even when permitted under the applicable law and arbitral rules, specific performance against a state may therefore…
Recently, it was reported that after 14 years since Zimbabwe had illegally evicted Dutch farmers from their farms, it finally agreed to pay the damages awarded under the ICSID award, which dates back in 2009. In the Funnekotter et al case, the arbitral tribunal rejected Zimbabwe’s necessity defence, which was based on the claimed need…
The latest large consumer data breach, this time involving Equifax, has also shed a sharp light on an ongoing controversy about consumers’ access to justice. In taking steps to ameliorate its PR crisis, Equifax found itself right in the middle of the dispute about class actions and arbitration clauses. On September 7, Equifax revealed that…
The Editorial Board of Kluwer Arbitration Blog announces the opening of the following positions with Kluwer Arbitration Blog: Assistant Editor for Europe, Assistant Editor for Asia (Hong Kong and PR China) and Assistant Editor for Africa. The Assistant Editors report directly to the Associate Editors and are expected to (1) collect, edit and review guest…
Gretta Walters is an Associate at Chaffetz Lindsey LLP in New York, where she represents individual and corporate clients in international and cross-border disputes in arbitration and in state and federal court. She has experience in arbitral proceedings under the arbitration rules of the International Court of Arbitration of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC),…
The decision of the Singapore Court of Appeal in Wilson Taylor Asia Pacific Pte Ltd v. Dyna-Jet Pte Ltd ([2017] SGCA 32) added another chapter to the debate on the validity of unilateral option clauses (or ‘sole option clauses’) in contracts. The Singapore Court of Appeal reaffirmed the Singapore High Court’s decision to uphold the…
Non-arbitrability of disputes is a ground for setting aside the arbitral awards under Sections 34(2)(b) and 48(2) of the Arbitration and Conciliation act 1996 (the “Act”), the award is against the public policy of India. Arbitrability, here, refers to the objective arbitrability of the disputes, i.e., whether the national law imposes any restriction on the…
