On June 20, 2019, the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union adopted the Directive (EU) 2019/1023 on restructuring and insolvency (hereinafter: Directive). The objectives of the Directive are to make it easier for companies in financial difficulty to access restructuring measures at an early stage to prevent them from becoming insolvent, to lay down minimal rules on the discharge of debt incurred by insolvent entrepreneurs and to increase the efficiency of preventive procedures and insolvency procedures, primarily to shorten the length of the procedures.

Stock incentive schemes granted by listed or unlisted companies such as s stock options, stock appreciation, restricted shares and stock awards are a common way of rewarding employees. Employees participating in stock incentive schemes are subject to individual income tax.

Information on record-high gun-jumping fines, imposed by national competition protection authorities, flooded the law-oriented news over the past years. It seems that countries like Poland (e.g. case Gazprom), France (e.g. case SFR-Altice), the UK (e.g. case PayPal), Mexico (e.g. case BAS Projects Corporation and other companies), and even Zimbabwe (e.g. case Innscor Africa) are all following the pattern of enhanced supervision of merger notification obligation and pre-closing activities of the parties, involved in M&A, and increasing amounts of fines.

The need for social distancing has come to the fore in 2020. Due to the global pandemic of the coronavirus disease, we had to suddenly find different solutions in our everyday life to make as little physical contact with each other as possible. Most areas of our daily lives were affected by some adjustments and the operation of corporate bodies of the company has been no exception to the changing reality.

The Constitutional Court of the Republic of Slovenia has decided to repeal provisions of the third and fourth paragraph of Article 68.a the Slovenian Tax Procedure Act. These provisions implemented taxation of undeclared income at 70% tax rate, which exceeds regular maximum 50% personal income tax rate and enables the taxation of undeclared income originating from the periods before January 1, 2009.

“The new Slovenian Prime Minister was elected by the National Assembly on March 13th, just as the crisis was picking up in this part of Europe,” says Uros Cop, Managing Partner at Law Firm Miro Senica and Attorneys, in Ljubljana. “Fairly quickly, the new Prime Minister formed a team of ministers, which was confirmed the following week by the Parliament – we were in luck that this process went smoothly.“

In The Corner Office feature of CEE Legal Matters we ask Managing Partners at leading law firms across Central and Eastern Europe about their unique roles and responsibilities. In light of current events, the question for this online occurrence of the feature is: "How are you managing your team working remotely during this challenging period?"

Slovenian national air-carrier Adria Airways is one of many European airlines that filed for bankruptcy in 2019. While passengers with planned trips and prepaid tickets were left to their own ingenuity, the Slovenian Government worried about the effects of Adria Airways’ bankruptcy on Slovenia’s air traffic and important airline connections from Ljubljana Airport to other important cities and regions.

Andersen Global has announced that it will collaborate with Miro Senica and Attorneys in Slovenia.

Resentment by domestic law firms in CEE markets against the international and regional firms that have moved in on their once exclusive domain is a common, though perhaps diminishing, refrain. How do domestic law firms in Slovenia feel about the foreign firms that have opened up shop next door?

Needless to say, business in the European Union is going through some turbulent times. How this is affecting the CEE region and how business in the region will adapt to this never-ending uncertainty is the million-dollar question that everyone is asking at the beginning of 2019.

As in almost all other jurisdictions, in Slovenia there are no cryptocurrency-specific tax laws. In order to shed light on the tax treatment of the cryptocurrency in Slovenia, in June 2018 the Financial Administration of the Republic of Slovenia (FURS) issued the extended and updated Guidelines on Tax Treatment of Cryptocurrencies in Slovenia (the “Guidelines”).

The recent buzz in Slovenia was all about the eagerly-awaited decision of the country’s Supreme Court regarding Swiss franc loans, says Miro Senica and attorneys Partner Katarina Kresal. That decision – which has since been followed by a few more – was finally issued at the end of 2018.

Law firm Miro Senica and Attorneys has advised household appliance manufacturer Gorenje d.d., on its December 20, 2018 sale of Gorenje Surovina d.o.o., a waste management services provider in Slovenia, to Eko Surovina d.o.o., a member of the Rastoder Group. Rojs, Peljhan, Prelesnik & Partners advised the buyers on the deal.

The well-formed regulation of competition is a precondition for a healthy and effective market. Thus, countries have to not only adopt appropriate legislation, but also ensure that the relevant authorities will enforce that legislation in a way that allows all participants in the market to carry out their activities in a fair environment.

A “qualifying shareholder” is any person intending to acquire or increase his or her bank shares in order to achieve or exceed a qualifying holding. The qualifying shareholder must be authorized by the European banking supervisor, the European Central Bank. Such authorization is first needed upon the acquisition of ten percent or more of the shares and/or voting rights in a bank. Subsequent authorizations are required when acquisitions of twenty, thirty, and/or fifty percent of the shares and/or voting rights in the bank are made. Importantly, the authorization procedure is activated not only upon the crossing of the relevant thresholds but also when the acquirer obtains the right to appoint the majority of the management board or any other means of exerting a significant influence on the bank’s management.

Katja Sumah has been promoted to Partner at Miro Senica and Attorneys.

With the tremendous increase in the price of cryptocurrencies in 2017 the world has witnessed an explosion of cryptocurrency-related enterprises, with initial coin offerings at the forefront. Several European countries have aligned their legislation to become appealing for such enterprises and Slovenia has been mentioned on several occasions as one of the most “crypto-friendly” countries. However, as Slovenian legislation offers a very high level of protection to personal data regarding identity documents, crypto business ventures within the Slovenian jurisdiction may be at a disadvantage against foreign competitors.