The US financial reporting season is in full swing and among the obvious winners is Shearman & Sterling, which last week posted positive global results and a 20 per cent hike in London office turnover. Shearman’s City office income grew from $112.6m to $134.8m during the year while its global revenue inched up 9.1 per […]
Bird & Bird dispute resolution head Steven Baker has come under fire from the High Court after he made a £635m “mistake” in calculating the claim value of a mammoth shareholder group action against the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS). The firm is representing around 12,000 retail and around 100 institutional clients which are suing […]
On 19 February 2014, the Supreme Court gave judgment in the case of Williams v Central Bank of Nigeria. The issue in the case was whether s21(1)(a) of the UK Limitation Act 1980 disapplies the statutory limitation period in respect of claims by a beneficiary under a trust against an accessory (a knowing recipient of […]
By Kate Macmillan Businesses that attempt to boost online sales by ‘piggybacking’ off the good reputations of similar products will have to radically rethink their tactics after a trademark decision in the High Court this month. The bottom line is this: use someone else’s trademark in adverts on a third-party search engine, such as Google, […]
By Jonathan Pawlowski Is your company a party to a construction contract or to a collateral warranty? You might think this is obvious; after all, your company’s contract manager is familiar with both types of document and knows the difference. However, what would happen if a collateral warranty was suddenly interpreted as a construction contract? […]
DLA Piper has released the 24 February 2014 issue of its Health Alert, which focuses on judgments, legislation and reports in the health sector. Click on the link below to read the rest of the DLA Piper briefing.
By George Gigounas, Matthew Covington and Christian A Orozco California’s Proposition 65, the Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986, finally has the attention of legislators and the governor’s office and is undergoing key changes. But significant reforms — to balance evidentiary burdens, discourage ‘shakedown’ litigation and otherwise aid retailers and manufacturers — appear to […]
By Paul N Monnin and Zachary LeVasseur The Second Circuit Court of Appeals has broadened the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC’s) power to seek civil disgorgement of profits from insider trading violations even where an individual did not personally profit from the illegal trades. In its panel opinion in SEC v Contorinis, decided on 18 […]
Jason Lovell, an oil and gas expert at Eversheds, has said that the UK government needs to ‘equip the Department of Energy & Climate Change [DECC] with the tools it needs’ in order to generate long-term tax revenue. Lovell was commenting following news that the UK government will fast-track the implementation of Sir Ian Wood’s recommendations for […]
Phillip Tunney, partner and head of the UK chemical sector group at Eversheds, has commented on the importance of protecting intellectual property (IP) for those in the chemical industry who are involved in collaborative R&D. Tunney — who was commenting following news of a growing trend for European chemicals and plastics manufacturers to cut in-house research […]
HowardKennedyFSI (HKFsi) is in merger talks with London firm CKFT as management pushes ahead with plans to tie-up with Davenport Lyons. A decision to merge with West End firm Davenport Lyons, which approached HKFsi days after its negotiations with Shakespeares were called off (30 January 2014), is expected to be made within the next six-weeks. However HKFsi […]
Paul Marshall from No5 Chambers was instructed with Philip Coppel QC of Landmark Chambers by Banks Kelly on behalf of the appellants on appeal to the Court of Appeal against the decision of HH Judge Pelling QC in Hone and Ors v Abbey Forwarding (in liquidation) and HMRC [2012] EWHC 3525 (Ch); [2013] 1 CH […]