Technical guidance published on the websites of the Hungarian Competition Authority (HCA) and the Public Procurement Authority in November 2023 on corruption risks and cartel agreements affecting the fairness of public procurements.

Cerha Hempel, working with the Italian offices of K&L Gates, has advised the EBRD on the sale of a 15% stake in Erste Bank Hungary to the Erste Group Bank. Addleshaw Goddard reportedly advised the Erste Group Bank.

Do defendants need to make a formal setoff statement against the creditor’s claim in front of the judge to extinguish the claimant’s claim? Or is it enough to refer informally to an earlier setoff made by them prior to the litigation? A fresh decision of the Hungarian Supreme Court, analysed in this article, gives answer to these questions.

On November 21, 2023, corporate/M&A and private equity experts from Bulgaria, Greece, Hungary, Kosovo, Moldova, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Turkiye, and Ukraine sat down for a virtual round table moderated by CEE Legal Matters Managing Editor Radu Cotarcea to discuss the key developments in the field over the past decade.

Forgo, Damjanovic & Partners Managing Partner Zoltan Forgo talks about the evolution of the practice and their role as legal advisors in Hungary over the last 10 years.

Nagy es Trocsanyi Partners Orsolya Kovacs and Viktor Jeger discuss the evolution of the energy sector and their role as legal advisors in Hungary over the last 10 years.

Oppenheim has advised the China National Machinery Import & Export Corporation and China Power International Holding on the acquisition of a project company developing a photovoltaic project with an installed capacity of 53.9 megawatts in Tiszafured, Hungary. Schoenherr advised the ID Energy Group on the sale.

AegisLegal has advised STRT Holding on the listing of its shares on the Budapest Stock Exchange.

In the summer 2022, the United States unilaterally terminated the US-Hungary double tax treaty with Hungary.

The Cybersecurity Act imposes new requirements on many companies regarding the operation of their electronic information systems. Organizations have until the end of 2023 to prepare to comply with the new rules.

Kinstellar Partner Balazs Sepsey has been appointed the new Office Managing Partner of the firm’s Budapest Office. Sepsey is taking over from Kristof Ferenczi, who has recently been appointed Kinstellar’s Firm Managing Partner (as reported by CEE Legal Matters on December 8, 2023).

Ban, S. Szabo, Rausch & Partners has advised ITK Holding on its acquisition of Omnibus Hungaria Kereskedelmi es Szolgaltato, a joint venture of EvoBus and Pappas Holding. Noerr reportedly advised the sellers.

At the II National Regulators Conference it was announced that the Digital Citizenship programme to be launched between July and September 2024 and the necessary legislation to be submitted to the Parliament in November 2023. With this step the Hungarian Government follows the trend, where citizens are dealing at an increasing rate with administrative cases on their mobile phones.

There is a bill on the new Hungarian Architecture Act, which would replace the acts on Engineers and Professional Chambers, on the Shaping and Protection of the Built Environment and on the Protection of Townscape, and will consolidate their provisions in a modernised and clear code.

Schoenherr has advised the MET Group on the completion of its photovoltaic plants located in Buzsak, Gerjen, and Sojtor, Hungary, with a total capacity of almost 169 megawatts and spanning 134 land plots with a total area of almost 310 hectares.

With CMS’s recently published European M&A Outlook report taking the temperature of the M&A activity across the continent, CMS Romania Managing Partner Horea Popescu and CMS Vienna Partner Alexander Rakosi share their insights on M&A trends in the CEE region.

In The Corner Office, we ask Managing Partners at law firms across Central and Eastern Europe about their backgrounds, strategies, and responsibilities. Shifting our focus to the financial aspects of legal work, we asked: What percentage of your issued bills end up being overdue, what percentage end up never paid, and what is your firm’s/office’s standard methodology to handle both cases?

In our Looking In series, we talk to Partners from outside CEE who are keeping an eye on the region (and often pop up in our deal lists) to learn how they perceive CEE markets and their evolution. For this issue, we sat down with Reed Smith Partner Kevin-Paul Deveau.