In an increasingly virtual world, law and regulation act as a vital safety net for businesses. The nature of that safety net varies, depending on the particular legal jurisdiction where the businesses are located. Global providers in the FinTech arena can be mobile and nimble and must choose their home country for these purposes carefully.

Partner Lyle Roberts (Washington, D.C.-Litigation) has authored an article titled, “The Ninth Circuit’s Recent Decisions on the Pleading of Loss Causation in Securities Fraud Cases,” for The Review of Securities & Commodities Regulation.

The first months of the Biden Administration signaled the new US President’s willingness to remain tough on China in the short term. Meanwhile, the new Administration appeared to pause the US “maximum pressure” policy against Iran as it engages in multi-lateral discussions to explore options for resuming US participation in a nuclear deal.

On Wednesday, March 31, the Biden administration released its American Jobs Plan (AJP), a detailed blueprint to spend more than $2 trillion over eight years for a wide range of infrastructure-related initiatives, including both “core” or “traditional” infrastructure programs as well as “non-core” and social welfare proposals. The administration has signaled that the AJP is the first of two large legislative packages it intends to introduce over the coming weeks, with the second to focus on other issues such as health and education.

On March 29, 2021, the SEC’s Division of Examinations issued a Risk Alert emphasizing broker-dealers’ obligations to monitor and report suspicious activity. The alert includes observations from SEC examination staff on the adequacy of firms’ AML compliance programs, particularly the detection and reporting of red flags relating to abrupt increases in volume in low-priced or thinly-traded stocks. While these are not new regulatory concerns, they are the subject of renewed focus by staff following the recent price and volume volatility in certain stocks driven by social media.

In this article, first published in Thomson Reuters Regulatory Intelligence on March 23, partner Brian G. Burke (New York & Shanghai-Litigation), senior associate Mathew Orr (London-Litigation) and associate Rishikeesh Wijaya (Singapore-Litigation) consider the latest developments and trends in anti-money laundering (AML) regulation and enforcement across Asia.

The U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and the U.S. Treasury Department (“Treasury”) have issued final regulations (T.D. 9944) (the “Final Regulations”) providing additional guidance on several aspects of the income tax credit for the capture of qualified carbon oxide (CO) under section 45Q of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended (the “Code”). By largely adopting the proposed regulations released on May 28, 2020 (REG -112339-19) (the “Proposed Regulations”), discussed in our client alert dated June 22, 2020, with certain helpful modifications, the Final Regulations aim to alleviate some of the uncertainty previously faced by developers and should attract more widespread attention and investor participation.

On March 10, 2021, the European Parliament adopted a resolution calling for mandatory human rights, environmental and governance due diligence standards across the value chain for companies operating in the EU internal market (the “Resolution”).[1] The Resolution was accompanied by an annex setting out recommended text (the “Recommendations”) for a Directive on Corporate Due Diligence and Corporate Accountability (the “Directive”), for consideration by the European Commission. The Commission has announced that it will submit a legislative proposal for the Directive later in 2021.

On March 29, the Federal Reserve Board, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and the National Credit Union Administration (the “Federal Agencies”) issued a request for information (“RFI”) from financial institutions, trade associations, consumer groups, and other stakeholders on the financial industry’s use of artificial intelligence (“AI”). The RFI broadly seeks insight into the industry’s use of AI in the provision of financial services to customers and appropriate AI governance, risk management, and controls.

On March 22, 2020, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear Servotronics, Inc. v. Rolls-Royce PLC and the Boeing Co., Case No. 20-794, a case that raises the question of whether a commercial arbitration tribunal is a “foreign or international tribunal” within the meaning of 28 U.S.C. § 1782 (“Section 1782”). Section 1782 is a federal statute that allows parties to petition U.S. federal courts for discovery assistance—including the production of documents and taking of depositions—in aid of a “foreign or international tribunal.” Such assistance can be a powerful tool for parties requiring discovery from parties that are outside the jurisdiction of an arbitral tribunal.