Zoltan Lengyel, the current Managing Partner of the Allen & Overy Budapest office, has announced that he will retire on May 1, with Counsel Miklos Kadar taking over the management of the Budapest office from that date.

The book European Court Procedure – A Practical Guide (Bloomsbury-Hart, Oxford, 730 p.) has been written by professionals having a combined experience of 70 years as referendaires at the EU Courts or members of the European Commission Legal Service. It gives a detailed and practice-oriented overview of the whole spectrum of litigation procedure before the EU judiciary. It also presents the entire system of judicial avenues that enable litigants to enforce their rights under EU law against European institutions, Member States or private parties.

Csaba Rusznak has joined KNP Law Nagy-Koppany Lencs & Partners to lead the firm’s Dispute Resolution Practice Group. At the same time, Oliver Koppany has joined the firm as Foreign Legal Counsel.

The supervisory activity of the National Media and Infocommuncations Authority (“NMIA”) and the operation of communication service providers will be highly affected by the implemented provisions of the European Electronic Communications Code that prescribes the applicable new European framework of electronic communications.

According to a press release of the Hungarian Competition Authority (GVH) issued on 16 December 2020, GVH is launching a market analysis to investigate how customer datasets of e-commerce companies are created and also the role of such assets in the competition between online stores. The investigation will further cover the extent of the customers’ awareness of such data collection and its influence on their decisions.

In December 2020, KELER Kozponti Ertektar Zrt. (KELER Central Securities Depository Ltd.) (KELER), the central depository of Hungary, was granted an authorisation under the Central Securities Depositories Regulation (CSDR Regulation) and can now offer its clients services supporting an efficient and secure securities market as a central securities depository operating under unified European regulations.

At the end of December 2020, several new regulations have been accepted to facilitate constructions due to the state of emergency. As one of the most important news, the Hungarian Government has extended the application of simple notification to the construction activities of a residential building including maximum six flats, but having a total net floor space of maximum 1,000 sqm.

Act Ban & Karika has helped Germany's Bader Group reorganize within the framework of the cross-border insolvency proceeding of its Hungarian subsidiary.

The Hungarian Government announced at the end of 2020, that similarly to previous years, it will launch the fifth edition of the so called ‘EPITO’ (“Constructing”) program.

Balazs Kovacs, Anna Buzas, and Gabor Marky have been promoted to Partner at BPV Jadi Nemeth in Budapest.

Looking at the volume of non-performing loans in the balance sheets of the Hungarian banks, it is possible to believe that the situation has never been better. In fact, however, this is primarily due to the general moratorium introduced by the Hungarian government in March 2020, which protected both companies and consumers against insolvency and non-payment. Now, eight months later, financial institutions are preparing for a potentially massive wave of bankruptcies, as they already reserved HUF 250 billion in the first half of this year.

One of the most important issues facing businesses in CEE is the impact of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic on litigation and arbitration. In-person court and arbitration hearings have become problematic, if not impossible, and the importance of certain boilerplate contract clauses has skyrocketed. Zsolt Okanyi, Global Head of Dispute Resolution at CMS, Malgorzata Surdek, Head of Dispute Resolution at CMS Poland, and Daniela Karollus Bruner, Head of Dispute Resolution at CMS Austria, evaluate the current situation.

In The Corner Office we ask Managing Partners across Central and Eastern Europe about their unique roles and responsibilities. The question this time: “What one ongoing pro bono initiative or project or charity/volunteering project that your firm is involved with has the most meaning for you personally, and why?”

Bence Molnar and Gyorgy Wellmann have made Partner at Szecskay Attorneys at Law in Budapest.

Protecting workplaces and businesses is still of foremost importance amidst fighting the second wave of COVID-19. In order to so, Hungary, like most of other developed countries, adopted wage subsidies to encourage employers not to lay off their workers.

Act Ban & Karika has helped Hungarian information database provider Opten Ltd. enter the international market with its new website, opten.eu, offering almost three million companies’ public business information across six CEE countries. 

According to the changes of the act of the local business tax adopted on 26 November 2020, taxpayers have to submit their tax return to the tax authority, which means that what was an option until the end of the 2020 year, has become an obligation. As of 1 January 2021, the tax authority supervises and verifies the tax returns and also indicates immediately the calculation errors to the taxpayers, which can be corrected by correction or self-audit.

Dentons has advised a syndicate of underwriters including BNP Paribas, Citi, and J.P. Morgan, on Wizz Air’s successful issue of EUR 500 million 1.350% fixed Rate guaranteed notes due 2024 under Wizz Air's Euro Medium Term Note Program, which was oversubscribed with books exceeding EUR 2 billion. The notes were guaranteed by Wizz Air Holdings Plc. Clifford Chance and Ogier advised Wizz Air on the deal.