Russia

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Low angle view looking down Lime Street to Lloyds of London Building, The Scalpel Building, Willis Building and The Leadenhall Building in the City of London UK

The English High Court found that a current risk of unfair trial in Russia justified declining to enforce Russian exclusive jurisdiction clauses.

By Oliver Middleton and Sean Newhouse

The English High Court has cleared the way for major aviation insurance litigation to proceed in England. In an important judgment on jurisdiction, the High Court refused to stay a group of claims based on the alleged total loss of aircraft formerly leased to Russian airlines. The defendants contended that any such…

The key issues PE deal teams are facing amidst rapidly changing global sanctions and guidance.

By Les Carnegie, Charles Claypoole, Tom D. Evans, David J. Walker, Ruchi Gill, Alli Hugi, Thomas Lane, and Catherine Campbell

Russia’s recent invasion of Ukraine has created new headwinds for PE firms, as a matrix of sanctions and export controls pose legal challenges for portfolio companies and transaction targets. With sanctions regimes getting ever more complex and such complexity unlikely to reduce any time soon, deal planning and execution requires expert legal counsel and skilful navigation.

New legislation introduces further sanctions powers and aims to tackle financial crime by revealing identities of overseas beneficial owners of UK property.

By Stuart Alford QC, Robert Price, Thomas Lane, and Harriet Slater

Following the UK government’s successive sanctions packages, which are the subject of recent Latham & Watkins Client Alerts,[1] the response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has been extended to cover wider financial crime measures.

The Economic Crime (Transparency and Enforcement) Act 2022 (Act) received royal assent on 15 March 2022, introducing a new register of overseas entities (Register) holding UK property assets, alongside changes to the unexplained wealth order (UWO) and sanctions regimes. Reforms to the role of Companies House are expected to follow in subsequent legislation.

By Ragnar Johannesen

While the CIS nations have recently provided a multitude of sizeable restructuring cases, the region’s dominant force, Russia, has stood up reasonably well to lengthy economic decline, economic sanctions and the collapse of oil and gas prices. There are now signs however, that its complex troubles are pushing certain companies towards a restructuring or insolvency position.

Russian, Ukrainian and CIS restructurings can be especially challenging, not least because of the complex corporate and capital structures that these companies often employ, using  multiple offshore vehicles (usually in jurisdictions like Cyprus, the Netherlands and the BVI). Information gathering can therefore be incredibly difficult and there may be major issues around corporate governance and the reliability or usefulness of the accounts provided.

CIS companies often have capital structures that have multiple and indistinguishable layers. The balance sheet usually  includes a combination of a multitude of bilateral loans, alongside a syndicated facility as well as bonds, but there will be very little inter-linkage between them (i.e. ordinarily no intercreditor agreement).