Latin American Arbitration Practitioners EU (LATAP) is a project initiated by seven Latin American lawyers specialised in international arbitration and working in top tier law firms across Europe. These law firms include: Volterra Fietta, Shearman & Sterling, Lalive, Hanotiau & van den Berg, Latham & Watkins and Dechert. Continue reading
Prevailing in arbitration as well as in subsequent enforcement proceedings in Switzerland will be all for naught if the award debtor is able to frustrate the enforcement of the award (for example, by transferring its assets outside of Switzerland) before the award creditor can satisfy its claim(s). Continue reading
The Abu Dhabi Global Market Arbitration Centre (ADGMAC) has recently launched its Arbitration Guidelines to the great acclaim of the local arbitration community. The Arbitration Guidelines are published in English and seek to provide best practice procedural guidance on the conduct of an arbitration process to arbitrators and parties alike. The Arbitration Guidelines are a soft-law instrument that does not produce any binding effect, neither on the parties nor on the arbitral tribunal, unless agreed otherwise. In this sense, the parties are free to contract into the provisions of the Guidelines wholesale or only in part. In a further alternative, the parties may agree to the application of the Guidelines or portions thereof by way of guidance to the tribunal only. In this sense, the overarching objective of the Guidelines is to “provide parties and tribunals with a set of innovative best practice procedures to assist in bringing greater certainty and efficiency to the arbitral process, while ensuring fairness, equality and due process” (see Introduction to the Guidelines). Continue reading
There is an important distinction between an arbitral award and other decisions made by an arbitral tribunal during the course of an arbitration. A decision that has the status of an award can be challenged or appealed to a national court and can be enforced under the relevant international conventions. In contrast, a decision that has the status of a procedural order cannot. Continue reading
The problem in a nutshell: consent
Documents executed by only one party in favour of a non-signatory are commonplace in commercial transactions, for example in the financial services and construction sectors where guarantees and bonds are often issued in this way. However, when parties are trying to resolve disputes arising under what are, for convenience, referred to as “unilateral documents” in this blog, they may encounter a number of legal hurdles. Continue reading
Quantum of suffering
The English High Court recently provided the Federal Government of Nigeria (FGN) some respite in its ongoing dispute with the British Virgin Islands company, Process & Industrial Developments Ltd (P&ID) by granting FGN leave to appeal and a stay on enforcement of the arbitral award made against it in January 2017. Having seen the arbitral award converted to an English High Court judgment in August 2019, P&ID had set about attempting to enforce the judgment against FGN’s foreign assets. This was no small matter for FGN, as the amount of the arbitral award (initially US $6.6 billion, now US $9.6 billion, given the eye-watering interest of US $1.3 million per day) would have a significant impact on Nigerian reserves and the Nigerian economy in general. US $9.6 billion represents around 20% of FGN’s total foreign reserves, one third of FGN’s 2019 fiscal budget, 2.5% of its total GDP and more than 50% of its earnings from crude oil in 2018. FGN unsuccessfully contested the award in August 2019 on several grounds, including that the award was “manifestly excessive” and, therefore, contrary to public policy. But a question that many readers will be wondering is: how did we even get here? Continue reading
As discussions around Brexit, US-China and transatlantic trade continue, the question of the best mechanism for settling investor state disputes remains. Continue reading
With thanks to Varnika Chawla, trainee solicitor (India Qualified) in the International Arbitration and Construction Disputes Group at Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner LLP for co-authoring this blog.
On 9 August 2019, the Indian Arbitration and Conciliation (Amendment) Act 2019 was published. This will come into force as and when the central government notifies by way of Official Gazette. The Act amends the Indian Arbitration and Conciliation Act 1996 and is the latest in a series of steps designed to make India a more arbitration-friendly jurisdiction. Continue reading
Mention section 70 of the Arbitration Act 1996 (AA 1996) to most arbitration practitioners and it is likely that they will immediately think of the sections 70(2) and (3). They require: Continue reading
On 16 August 2019, the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) published its third working paper on its proposed amendments to the ICSID Arbitration Rules. ICSID intends to submit the revised rules to member states for consultation in November 2019 and to approve the final text of the rules next year. Continue reading