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“Sailing into the rules of smart contracts...”
In this Spotlight article, the authors consider the significance of Lord Justice Lopes’ judgment in The Satanita [1897] AC 59 to shaping development and innovation in contracting through smart contracts.
13 June 2024What sort of property is a cryptoasset?
There is now an emerging consensus that cryptoassets are property – judges have so held in cases in England and other jurisdictions and it is the unanimous conclusion of independent reports on the topic.1 But what sort of property? The category of property into which cryptoassets are placed has wide implications in areas such as insolvency, security and tax. Two rival schools of thought have developed and the ongoing confusion has led to legal uncertainty. In this article, we argue for the correct categorisation based on a principled explanation of why different categories of property exist and how they apply to cryptoassets.
13 June 2024Smart contracts: navigating a course between a consensus arrangement and a legal contract
In this Spotlight article, the authors propose a rebuttal to one of the conclusions in ‘Sailing into the rules of smart contracts’, an article co-authored by Akber Datoo and Jeffrey Golden and published in the June edition of this journal ((2021) 6 JIBFL 387).
13 June 2024Big enough: understanding and complying with law through computational analysis of legal data
A 2011 report by McKinsey Global Institute predicted that “big data” would grow in importance, “underpinning new waves of productivity growth”. Now, nearly ten years later, that prediction has come true. The focus of this Spotlight article is not big data, but data sets in the legal world, which share some of the characteristics of big data. The different nature of these data sets creates opportunities for targeted applications that allow the data – the law – to be analysed and rendered useful in making critical legal and compliance decisions. Legal data, though not big data, is nevertheless big enough to support the development of these analytical tools.
13 June 2024The disclosure regime in the public and private share investment market
In the context of the demise of Greensill Capital, in this Spotlight article the authors consider the levels of protection afforded to sophisticated and retail investors and question whether existing rules can cope with the emergence of crowdfunding platforms that enable retail investors to invest in private companies.
13 June 2024Will COVID change legal systems permanently?
This Spotlight article discusses the long-term impact of COVID on world legal systems, in particular whether COVID will crystallise legal upheavals around the world and whether it will cast a grim shadow over the law or a redeeming glow. I am mainly concerned with financial, corporate and commercial law. My enquiry relates to the post-COVID world, not emergency legislation during COVID. I deal with actual changes to the law, not how it is practised. Thus, I do not aim to cover the documentation of deals, or shifts in market practice, or the future of remote working, or the availability and cost of credit. My focus is on large-scale permanent changes to legal systems themselves, which in turn excludes emergency legislation.
13 June 2024The tide has gone out: the structure of UK financial services legislation post-Brexit: Part 5
This Part 5 covers the legislative endgame leading up to the UK’s final withdrawal from the European Union’s Single Market and Customs Union after the transition period.
13 June 2024Robinhood: hero or outlaw?
At the end of January, media and market participants watched in amazement as a drama unfolded, featuring Reddit, an ailing video game shop, and million-dollar losses for hedge fund managers. Venessa Parekh and Joanna Perkins take a closer look.1
13 June 2024Preserving the pillars of banking law: safeguarding core legal principles in an age of consumer protection
Consumer protection is best achieved through legislation and regulation, not by diluting or departing from established principles of common law and equity. Where a particular social problem affecting consumers is identified, such as the proliferation of Authorised Push Payment fraud, changes in the regulatory rules can provide the solution, taking into account a full range of policy factors. Courts should resist the inclination to step in with solutions that may seem to provide justice on the facts of the particular case, but do injustice in the wider sense of undermining the certainty and predictability that a stable system of legal principles is there to provide.
03 June 2024Legal platforms as economic tools
In this Spotlight article Guy Beringer considers the importance of legal platforms as valuable economic assets; he argues that this requires: (i) an understanding of the value that can accrue to an economy as a result of the efficiency of a legal platform; (ii) planning of the legal platform so that it keeps pace with development; and (iii) investment in the legal platform.
29 May 2024
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