News

20.09.2024 - Alliance: Tightening of Chinese corporate criminal law – What risks arise for foreign companies and their managing directors in China?

On 29 December 2023, the National People's Congress (the legislature of the People's Republic of China) made significant amendments to the criminal law.

This change in the law, which has meanwhile come into force, is in line with the central government's promise to sharpen the focus on lawful conduct by private companies in China and to fight corruption with all severity.

09.07.2024 - Alliance: ESG regulation: What companies need to prepare for now

In recent months, the EU Parliament has passed a large number of ESG-related (ESG: Environmental, Social and Governance) legislative proposals. Given the speed and variety of new laws, it is important for entrepreneurs and organisations to stay informed about the latest developments in ESG legislation. Below we provide an overview of the current ESG regulatory requirements in the package of measures relating to the Green Deal and explain what companies should consider in the near future.

17.06.2024 - Alliance: The Chinese data protection labyrinth: guidelines for legal data export

Since the beginning of 2022, a large number of data protection laws have been enacted in China. Since there was initially a lack of necessary concreteness and harmonisation of these laws, their specific scope and significance was difficult to estimate for foreign enterprises in China. In 2023 and 2024, there has been a large number of legal amendments and significant concretisation in data protection law.

25.03.2024 - Alliance: Cybercrime: Risks in international payment transactions

Today, more and more business activities and professional activities are shifting to the digital world. The coronavirus pandemic has contributed significantly to this trend, as it has forced us to adapt to new realities. This situation, as well as the efficiency and convenience of remote work, has created a new working reality, which in turn brings new risks of which many of us were previously unaware. We are talking about cybercrime, which companies in particular can suffer.

14.03.2024 - The name changes. The expertise remains.  SCWP is now SAXINGER.

We’ve got some news – We're SAXINGER now.

And the reason is simple: because we're all about change and constant growth. And we strive to bring absolute clarity, not only in terms of business law, but also when it comes to our name.

Since the firm's foundation, significant strides have been made. By changing our name, we aim to emphasize our commitment to past values and achievements while simultaneously paving the way for innovative developments, streamlined structures, and a promising future.

Welcome to SAXINGER

 

20.02.2024 - Alliance: International remote work- tax implications for companies and employees

In our rapidly evolving global labour landscape, remote work has become a central theme and a defining feature of the modern workforce. This newsletter looks at the subtleties of cross-border remote working from a tax perspective and examines the complex considerations that need to be borne in mind by both employers and employees. We address the tax implications of cross-border work and cover topics such as tax residency, double taxation agreements, permanent establishments and income tax deduction obligations.

14.06.2023 - Alliance: The Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD)

The directive on sustainability reporting (EU) 2022/2464, Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive, abbreviated “CSRD”) leads to an expansion of the reporting obligation for thousands of companies throughout Europe, starting from financial year 2024, for reports published in 2025. The CSRD amends the existing directive on non-financial reporting and establishes both more detailed reporting obligations, on the one hand, and a larger circle of companies required to issue such reports on the other.

12.06.2023 - Alliance: Transfer Pricing - General Overview 2023

Transfer pricing plays an essential role in all jurisdictions, as it determines a large part of the profits of related parties, which entails a significant amount of income taxes that may be imposed on them. In this first Schindhelm Alliance tax newsletter we give you a general overview of the subject and then report on the specifics in some of the main jurisdictions in which our Alliance operates.

19.05.2023 - Alliance: New regulatory hurdles in M&A transactions

In the case of M&A transactions, all participants strive for a quick closing and thus legal certainty in the future. Previously, an M&A transaction was checked ex ante by the responsible competition authorities if certain turnover thresholds were exceeded to determine whether the project would create or strengthen a dominant position. However, this legal certainty is now lost due to the most recent practice and case law of the European Court of Justice (hereinafter referred to as “ECJ”), since, even if the turnover thresholds are not met, there is the possibility of an ex post content review and, if necessary, a reversal obligation.

03.04.2023 - Spain: Holiday Properties - Taxes & Inheritance: Spain

The decision to purchase a holiday home is often made on a wave of emotion, with the exuberance of great memories of a beautiful summer holiday. But however enthusiastic you are about the beauty of your home and its area, it is important to also keep an eye on the costs in order to avoid unpleasant surprises later on leading to “buyer’s remorse”. These start with the ancillary costs of the actual purchase and can continue until the inheritance tax in the case of an inheritance.

In the following article, we review the costs you need to take into account for Spain as they occur on the purchase of the property, during its ongoing use, on its sale or transfer as a gift, or even in the event of inheritance.

03.04.2023 - Italy: Holiday Properties - Taxes & Inheritance: Italy

The decision to purchase a holiday home is often made on a wave of emotion, with the exuberance of great memories of a beautiful summer holiday. But however enthusiastic you are about the beauty of your home and its area, it is important to also keep an eye on the costs in order to avoid unpleasant surprises later on leading to “buyer’s remorse”. These start with the ancillary costs of the actual purchase and can continue until the inheritance tax in the case of an inheritance.

In the following article, we review the costs you need to take into account for Italy as they occur on the purchase of the property, during its ongoing use, on its sale or transfer as a gift, or even in the event of inheritance.

03.04.2023 - Turkey: Holiday Properties - Taxes & Inheritance: Turkey

The decision to purchase a holiday home is often made on a wave of emotion, with the exuberance of great memories of a beautiful summer holiday. But however enthusiastic you are about the beauty of your home and its area, it is important to also keep an eye on the costs in order to avoid unpleasant surprises later on leading to “buyer’s remorse”. These start with the ancillary costs of the actual purchase and can continue until the inheritance tax in the case of an inheritance.

In the following article, we review the costs you need to take into account for Turkey as they occur on the purchase of the property, during its ongoing use, on its sale or transfer as a gift, or even in the event of inheritance.

13.03.2023 - Alliance: Legally compliant whistleblowing in your company - country update

“Whistleblowing” describes the uncovering of abuses, such as corruption, money laundering, and environmental hazards, by whistleblowers who have acquired insider knowledge due to their professional activity. Whistleblowers must usually accept serious personal or professional disadvantages as a result of their reports.

To protect whistleblowers, the EU already issued the Whistleblowing Directive in 2019. This directive stipulates that enterprises have the obligation to establish channels and procedures to enable reports of abuses and breaches of the law.

13.02.2023 - Alliance: Foreign Subsidies Regulation: How will new regulation impact and reshape the M&A and public tender offers market?

On 12 January 2023 the Regulation (EU) 2022/2560 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 December 2022 on foreign subsidies distorting the internal market (hereinafter: the “FSR Regulation”) has entered into force.

The FSR Regulation, which will apply from 12 July 2023, equips the European Commission (hereinafter: the “Commission”) with new tools preventing distortion in competition of the internal (EU) market resulting from “foreign subsidies” meaning subsidies granted by the non-EU states to the entities operating on the internal market.

31.01.2023 - Alliance: The end of trust-based working hours? Practical effects of the decision of the BAG dated 13/09/2022

With a judgment from 2019, the ECJ had clearly set the direction: From the Working Hours Directive in conjunction with Art. 31 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (CFR), there is the obligation of the Member States to ensure that employers introduce an “objective, reliable and accessible system that can be used to measure the daily working hours worked by employees”; this follows from the right of employees to effective health protection and compliance with the legally prescribed (weekly and daily) maximum working hours. However, the ECJ had not set a specific deadline for the Member States.

Over three full years, the requirements of the ECJ then remained without any significant practical consequences, with a few exceptions that we will present below on a country-specific basis. And it was probably generally assumed that legislative intervention would be required for the practical implementation of the judgment. However, the German Federal Labour Court has now taken the ball directly and formulated directly from existing law specific obligations incumbent on the employer even without legislative measures.

17.11.2022 - Alliance: Is your company a "Gatekeeper"? Digital Markets Act News

The applicable e-commerce policy is over 20 years old. That is why the European Union launched a regulatory package for online platforms a few years ago.

02.11.2022 - Legally compliant whistleblowing in your company - country update in Hungary

Although the deadline has expired, no legislative proposal or other draft for transposing Directive 2019/1937/EC on whistleblowing into national law has yet been submitted in Hungary. However, Act CLXV 2013 on complaints and communications of public interest already contains provisions that the legislature will likely supplement and/or amend in the near future.

19.10.2022 - Alliance: Remote Work: Revolution in the labour market through hybrid forms of working

Working from home, New Work, flexibility, self-organisation, trust-based working hours. These (and other) terms describe what is no longer a vision of the future or a mere phenomenon. Day-to-day working life has fundamentally changed in the last two and a half years at the latest since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, which acted as a catalyst in this respect.

22.09.2022 - Alliance: A bird's eye view of the law: The commercial use of unmanned aircraft

The development and commercialisation of drones is making relentless progress. Due to the wide range of applications and the rapid technical advances, unmanned aircraft – or “UAS” (=Unmanned Aircraft System) for short – are predicted to be a promising future.

01.09.2022 - The end of trust-based working hours in Hungary

In Hungary, the employer's obligation to keep records of working and rest periods is anchored in the Labour Code. Pursuant to Article § 134, the employer registers the duration of ordinary and extraordinary working hours, on-call duty days and holidays. The records must also provide an up-to-date overview of the start and end of regular and extraordinary working hours as well as the on-call times.

05.07.2022 - Alliance: What to do if the company is hacked? Actions from a legal perspective.

In case of a hacking attack, unauthorised attackers attempt to access external PCs, notebooks, smartphones, tablets or even entire corporate networks. Since the frequency of such attacks has increased massively in Europe over the past year, in this article we look at the successful hacker attack from the outside, which encrypts the affected systems in such a way that the company can no longer access its system at all.

19.06.2022 - Alliance: New opportunities and threats in sales: revised Vertical Block Exemption Regulation 2022 in force.

The European Commission’s Vertical Block Exemption Regulation (“VBER”), which was previously potentially applicable to distribution, whereby agreements between manufacturers or suppliers and retailers are exempt from the ban on cartels, ceased to be in force on 31/05/2022, because the original period of validity of 12 years was reached.
These new versions bring some changes which relax requirements compared to the previous legal situation, but also tighten requirements, which primarily take into account the area of tension between online/offline sales.

23.05.2022 - Alliance: Digital Revolution & Legal Evolution – copyright and related IP rights in the digital domestic market

Cryptocurrency, big data, artificial intelligence, data theft, cloud, virtual, augmented, or mixed reality, cyber warfare, telemedicine, social media, autonomous driving, Industry 4.0, Criminal Law 4.0, NFTs – these are not the only issues that are bringing about the era of the fourth so-called digital revolution. Each of these digital changes is bringing new challenges to all facets of society – the link between law and technology is one of the biggest. An example that illustrates the special relationship between legal and digital technologies very well are NFTs (non-fungible tokens).

14.04.2022 - Alliance: The current turning point – Force Majeure and loss of the basis for business

The "current turning point" in connection with the Russian war of aggression on Ukraine has not only a political but also perhaps an even greater economic dimension. The sharp rise in the price of raw materials and energy has led to a dramatic increase in costs for companies. The interruption of supply chains often causes production downtimes in industry. Despite all the harmonisation of laws that has taken place in the last 20 to 30 years, especially in the European legal sphere, this issue has remained untouched by efforts at legal standardisation. The reason for this was apparently a lack of topicality. Therefore, with this article, we provide an overview of how this topic is handled legally with regard to three key questions in the respective countries of our partner law firms.

01.03.2022 - The commercial use of unmanned aircraft in Hungary

In Hungary, legislature fulfilled its harmonisation obligation in 2021 and adopted a substantial part of the Drone Regulation into the Aviation Act of 1995, but several other laws were also affected by related adaptations.

09.02.2022 - Alliance: The Digital Service Act and the upcoming reform of the digital services

Already in 2020, the European Commission presented the draft for a new EU regulation on a single market for digital services, through which the latest developments in the field of digital services are to be incorporated and regulated at EU level. The proposal aims at better protection of consumer rights in the digital environment and at the joint internal market-related enforcement potential of the EU Member States.

01.01.2022 - Force Majeure and loss of the basis for business in Hungary

In Hungary, either party may apply for a judicial modification of the contract if, in a durable legal relationship between the parties, as a result of a circumstance occurring after concluding the contract, performance of the contract under unchanged conditions would violate its substantial legal interest and the possibility of the change of circumstances was not foreseeable at the time of concluding the contract, was not caused by it and does not fall within its ordinary business risk.

01.01.2020 - SAXINGER COVID-19-Unit

The current events following the outbreak and spread of the corona virus raises numerous legal questions. SAXINGER has established a COVID- 19-Unit consisting of our experts in the legal fields most frequently affected. We support you in all legal issues arising from current and future restrictions affecting your business operations.

22.11.2019 - Austria: Even more transparency for transparent companies

State and corporate compliance obligations to combat money laundering and terrorist financing remain an utmost priority for EU member states. Companies (“legal entities”) have therefore been obliged to disclose their “beneficial owners”, among other things, for quite some time. In Austria, a separate database - the “Beneficial Owners Register” - was set up for this purpose. In course of the implementation of the 5th EU Money Laundering Directive, further tightening measures have now been adopted.

22.11.2019 - Slovakia: New law on whistleblowing

“Whistleblower” - people who point out violations of the law - will be protected even more in the future. This is the aim of a new law that came into force a few months ago. The new regulation adds to already existing provisions on the protection of whistleblowers in the employment relationship.

22.11.2019 - Italy: The new law on corporate crises as a “work in progress”

A new law on company crises has significantly changed the rules applicable to limited liability companies in this respect Among other things, the liability of the company’s management was tightened. Furthermore, the tasks of the supervisory body were expanded. The reform’s true impact remains to be seen: Will there be a change in corporate culture or will there be an increase in corporate crises?

22.11.2019 - Austria: On the termination of the lease due to considerably detrimental use

According to Sec. 1118 ABGB (Austrian Civil Code), the lessor can terminate a lease unilaterally prematurely if the lessee makes a “considerably detrimental use” of the leased object. The scope and content of these legal provisions is a constant source of discussion. The mere performance of structural alterations by the lessee without the consent of the lessor does not in itself justify a good cause for the termination of the lease.

22.11.2019 - Europe: Liability of the operator of a website for the Facebook “Like Button”

The European Court of Justice (ECJ) recently ruled on the long-discussed question of whether and how website operators can integrate the Facebook Like button (so-called “social plug-in”) in accordance with data protection requirements.Th ECJ’s investigation results from a legal dispute between the Consumer Association of North Rhine-Westphalia and a subsidiary of Peek & Cloppenburg KG.

22.11.2019 - Europe: Implementation of the EU trade secrets directive

The new “Law on Trade Secrets” now implements the so-called “EU Trade Secrets Directive”. This adopts the European legal requirements for the protection of confidential know-how and secret business information. Moreover, the new legal provisions contain limitation periods and important procedural provisions for the protection of trade secrets in court proceedings.

25.06.2019 - Spain: Simplification of establishing a company

The law 11/2018 dated 28 December has been in force since the beginning of the year. This selectively modifies the Commercial Code, the Stock Corporation Act and the Law on Auditing.

25.06.2019 - Turkey: The mandatory mediation procedure in Turkish law - labour law and commercial law suits

Justified by the goal of solving legal disputes in a fast and economical manner without filing lawsuits and thus relieving the overloaded Turkish courts, a mediation procedure is implemented as a mandatory pre-condition for filing a lawsuit according to Turkish labour and commercial law.

09.01.2019 - Austria: New protection of business secrets - entrepreneurs must act.

Companies invest in know-how, from which there are important competitive advantages. Valuable information is the currency of the knowledge-based company. Maintaining confidentiality of business secrets is therefore a management instrument for competitiveness and research innovations. The loss of secrets can result in serious consequences, in particular, and generally can no longer be reversed.

22.11.2018 - Slovakia: new conditions for the employment of foreigners

Due to the low unemployment rate in Slovakia, employers have recently been confronted with a lack of available workers.

22.11.2018 - Poland: higher wage and incidental wage costs from 2019

In the budget planning for 2019, companies should prepare for the expected increase in Po-lish labour costs.

22.11.2018 - Poland: withdrawal as sole managing director will be slightly more difficult from 2019

In the business world, situations often arise in which the only existing managing director wants to leave the company.

22.11.2018 - Romania: implementation of the GDPR – law no. 190/2018

In Romania, law no. 190/2018, and thus the national implementation of the GDPR, took effect as of 31/07/2018. In comparison with other EU countries, law no. 190/2018 was rather short.

22.11.2018 - Germany: news on the shareholder list

When a new shareholder list must be submitted in the commercial register due to a change, it must satisfy the requirements of § 40 I GmbHG [Limited Liability Companies Act] in the version of 23/06/2017 according to the decision of the BGH [Federal Supreme Court] dated 26/06/2018 – II ZB 12/16.

22.11.2018 - The Czech Republic: changes in the payment of sick leave and consequences for the employer

In the Czech Republic, as of 01/07/2019, employees should already be entitled to sick leave from the first day of their inability to work.

22.11.2018 - new law concerning the protection of know-how – implementation of the know-how directive

The EU Directive on the regulation of confidential know-how and business information (know-how directive) was implemented in Hungary in July 2018.

22.11.2018 - Germany: no d&o protection for gmbh managing directors for payments after maturity of insolvency

If a Gmbh makes payments after it becomes insolvent, the Managing Directors are personal-ly liable vis-à-vis the company, regardless of the internal allocation of responsibilities.

22.11.2018 - Italy: new rules for small limited liability companies

With the large-scale reform of the company law from the year 2003, Italian legislators had simplified the regulations on the Governance of limited liability companies.

22.11.2018 - Europe: EUGH for the trade acceptance of European Union trademarks

Nestlé is a holder of a 3D EU trademark that corresponds to the "KitKat" bar marketed by it and protects its design.

22.11.2018 - Europe: billions in penalties against Google due to misuse by Android

Throughout Europe, approximately 80% of smartphones are equipped with the Google oper-ating system, Android...

22.11.2018 - Europe: softening of the primacy of application of community law by the ECJ decision "Taricco II"?

At the end of 2017, in the legal case C-42/17, the ECJ issued a much publicised decision on the question of the primacy of application of Community Law.

22.11.2018 - China: e-commerce law – impact on cross-border online business

In view of the rapid growth of online trade, the Chinese government adopted the first e-commerce law on the comprehensive regulation of online business on 31/08/2018, which will enter into force on 01/01/2019.

22.11.2018 - Bulgaria: new developments in the use and reclassification of agricultural areas

Since May 2014, ownership rights for land and soil can only be acquired by natural and legal persons who have resided or been established in Bulgaria for longer than five years.

22.11.2018 - Turkey: The decree to protect the value of the Turkish currency – limitation of foreign currency and foreign currency indexed contracts

The presidential decree no. 32 issued on 12/09/2018 to protect the value of the Turkish cur-rency ("Decree") sets the limitation of foreign currency and foreign currency indexed contracts and stipulates that these contracts must be converted within 30 days into Turkish Lira (“TL”).

22.11.2018 - Spain: Residual debt discharge for natural persons

The residual debt discharge (RDD) was introduced in 2015 as an exception from the princip-le of general asset liability of the debtor in the insolvency code.

28.06.2018 - Bulgaria: New requirements for company sale and insolvency

As in the past, in the case of company sales, the seller has repeatedly neither paid salaries due nor paid social security contributions due for employees, the Bulgarian Commercial Code was amended accordingly by three successive amendments in December 2017, February and March 2018.

28.06.2018 - Belgium: Fairness and transparency in online trading

Online platforms and search engines dominate Internet trading. Unilateral business conditions, non-transparent algorithms and rankings are unfortunately not uncommon.

28.06.2018 - Austria: E-allocation and safe linking by means of hash value

The electronic transmission of tenders in the award procedure is nothing new and was already standardised in the Federal Procurement Act 2006 both for the classical area and for the area of sector contractors.

24.05.2018 - New EU data protection law: Data transfer to third countries

International business transactions often involve cross border transfer of personal data. This is the case for instance where the data is stored on a server located in a third country (a country outside the EEA) or a third country IT service provider has access to the data processed by a company within the EU. If personal data is to be transferred to a third country specific provisions of the GDPR will apply.

25.04.2018 - New EU data protection law: Data breaches

As of 25 May 2018, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) introduces harsh sanctions for data breaches with extended scope of applicability.Companies and other data processing entities become potential subjects not only to the data subjects’ claims for damages, the enforceability of which has been enhanced, but also to increased administrative fines to be imposed by supervisory authorities.

12.03.2018 - New EU data protection law: Data Protection Officer

The General Regulation on Data Protection (GDPR) which will apply from 25th May 2018, introduces the position of the Data Protection Officer (DPO).The DPO shall be the contact person for and shall be involved in all data protection related issues of the given entity. The DPO is an organ within the company which liaises with the authority, the company and the data subjects.

15.02.2018 - New EU data protection law: Sanctions and liability

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) adopted by the EU Parliament in 2016 provides a higher standard of protection of personal data for EU citizens. The GDPR will have direct effect in all member states as of May 25, 2018 and it will affect businesses all around the world that are engaged in activities with individuals in the EU.

22.01.2018 - New EU data protection law: Principles on the processing of personal data

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) adopted by the EU Parliament in 2016 provides a higher standard of protection of personal data for EU citizens. The GDPR will have direct effect in all member states as of May 25, 2018 and it will affect businesses all around the world that are engaged in activities with individuals in the EU.

11.12.2017 - New EU data protection law: compliance check

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) of the EU will come into force on 25 May 2018 and it will affect organisations worldwide working with or within the EU. The GDPR promotes accountability and governance. Organisations are required to put into place comprehensive governance measures to ensure compliance. Non-compliance can lead to heavy fines up to EUR 20 million or 4 % of the global annual turnover, whichever is higher.

17.11.2017 - New EU data protection law: Fines up to EUR 20 million

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) adopted by the EU Parliament in 2016 provides a higher standard of protection of personal data for EU citizens. The GDPR will have direct effect in all member states as of May 25, 2018 and it will affect businesses all around the world that are engaged in activities with individuals in the EU.