Ukraine has been struggling to attract foreign investors for decades. Dozens of investment barrier reports, commitments within the Association Agreement and bilateral treaties, truly advanced laws have, in recent years, only slightly provided a meaningful environment to meet the preferences of investors.
by Nina Bets
The national environment of foreign investment and other economic activities in Ukraine is established and governed by Ukrainian legislation. However, foreign investors have an opportunity to have their interests protected in the event of violation of their rights by resorting to the use of international treaties and conventions signed and ratified by Ukraine.
by Olesia Kryvetska
In 2014, the European Commission concluded its negotiations with the Government of Canada with respect to the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement, which contains a separate Investment Chapter and is known as a first treaty to implement a new approach by the EU to resolving investor-state disputes, referred to as the Investment Court System1. The ICS implies a set of procedural and substantive rules that provide for establishment of a permanent dispute settlement institution consisting of the Tribunal of First Instance and the Appeal Tribunal.
by Mykhailo Razuvaiev
The Ukrainian tax legal framework has changed drastically over the last six months. In addition to significant changes to existing tax rules and procedures, completely new tax concepts have been introduced. These include the concepts of Controlled Foreign Companies and constructive dividends. Apart from the influence on purely Ukrainian businesses, the new rules and amendments will have an impact on investing in Ukraine and affect foreign businesses operating in Ukraine or dealing with Ukrainian counterparties.
Baker McKenzie advised Glencore Agriculture Limited
AVELLUM advised on Ukraine’s sovereign financing in excess of USD 1.5 billion
Sayenko Kharenko advised on USD 329 million Eurobond tap issue by Ukraine
Kinstellar advised Turkey Wealth Fund
Baker McKenzie advised State Property Fund of Ukraine on privatization of Dnipro Hotel
Sayenko Kharenko advised ADM, Bunge, Cargill, COFCO, Louis Dreyfus Company and Glencore Agriculture
US court froze execution of Trump order on blocking WeChat and TikTok
EU court finally refused to lift sanctions from Rosneft
Ukrhimtransamiak finally wins in tariff dispute with Russian giant
AMCU wins appeal against Tedis, meaning latter will pay remaining UAH 130 million fine
Supreme Court suspended execution of decision to collect USD 350 million from PrivatBank
Rada adopted in first reading draft law on cutting VAT for agricultural sector to 14%
Rada upheld establishment of Bureau of Economic Security in first reading
Tax reform
President signed law on state portfolio guarantees
Moratorium on debt collection extended
New rules to regulate electronic money market
Cabinet of Ministers adopted Priority Action Plan
Nvidia acquired Arm processor developer for USD 40 billion
Novus to acquire Billa supermarket chain
Spotify filed claim on non-competitive actions against Apple
World Bank suspends publication of Doing Business rating
Moody’s expects G20 countries GDP to fall by 4.6% in 2020 and rise by 5.3% in the next one
USA and EU agreed to reduce duties
Airbus presented zero carbon dioxide emission aircraft concept
AmCham Ukraine Leadership participated in meetings of the National Council on Anticorruption Policy and the National Reforms Council
On 28 September the President of the American Chamber of Commerce in Ukraine, Andy Hunder, took part in the meeting of the National Council on Anticorruption Policy under the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky.
Broad-based reforms in the strategic sectors of the Ukrainian economy are facing new issues, and demonstrated vital needs for transparent privatization and efficient investment protection. The announcement made by the country’s new leadership on the new course on preparing large state assets for privatization has been interfered with recently by the global pandemic. It’s certainly time to move from declared priorities to real, concrete steps forward, as Ukraine has already shown a number of successful privatization cases. Serhiy Piontkovsky, managing partner of Baker McKenzie – Kyiv, head of the energy, chemicals, mining and infrastructure and real estate practice groups, who advised almost all sound privatizations in our country, explained their importance in the pursuit of new success stories.
Andrii Romanchuk
Poland is a great destination for investment and business development, as confirmed by huge number of studies internal and external. The latest Global Best to Invest ranking (2019) indicates that Poland is in fifth place, after China, Germany, GB and India. The Financial Times report shows similar results, namely that Poland also ranks fifth in terms of the value of new investments.
by Andrii Chornous
In the period of 2014-2016 the National Bank of Ukraine carried out a “great bank cleansing”, which resulted in the withdrawal of 103 banks from the Ukrainian banking market. Since the assets of some of the insolvent and liquidated banks were insufficient to cover all debts, claims against the related parties of banks and shareholders whose actions contributed to insolvency are regularly considered by those creditors that have suffered losses. Pursuant to the data published by the Deposit Guarantee Fund of Ukraine (the “DGF”), 49 banks in Ukraine remained in the process of liquidation as of 8 September 2020. Consequently, lawsuits on collection of damages against the related parties of banks may remain an effective mechanism for creditors attempting to recover their losses.
As the new political season began in the last days of August, September appeared to be rich in new legislative initiatives and for continuing work on draft laws from the previous parliamentary session. Among those that definitely deserve attention are the widely discussed Draft Law On Bureau of Economic Security of Ukraine, several prospective drafts that promise amendments to trade remedies laws (Draft Laws No. 4132 and No. 4134) and a couple of possible amendments in the tax field. We asked the lawyers to share their expert opinions on these and other important legal matters.
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