On 14 May 2020, the Romanian Government adopted Emergency Ordinance no. 69/2020 (“the GEO”) which enables a series of tax facilities for taxpayers, as summarised below:

“What’s important to note is that Romania had a bit of political turmoil immediately before the crisis started,“ begins Florian Nitu, Partner at Popovici Nitu Stoic & Asociatii in Bucharest. “The Prime Minister and the President engaged in a political struggle, with the PM backed by the left-wing socialist party coalition in power. Luckily, this conflict was resolved and tensions decreased – just when Covid-19 hit Romania.“ As a result of this decrease, he says, the country was able to tackle the crisis without unnecessary distraction.

As a state of alert has been declared at national level, the Romanian government has imposed a series of measures with a significant impact on the activity of economic operators.

The COVID-19 pandemic constitutes an unprecedented challenge that continued to escalate worldwide, including in Romania. Among the severe consequences affecting people’s health, the pandemic had a negative impact on the businesses across all sectors as well.

Filip & Company has assisted Raiffeisen Bank on the May 14, 2020, listing of lei-denominated subordinated bonds on the Bucharest Stock Exchange.

Florina Homeghiu has joined the Policolor-Orgachim group as its new Legal and Compliance Group Director in Romania.

As well known, the processing of special categories of personal data is prohibited under article 9 of GDPR, unless one of the exceptions for processing is met. In the first part of this article available here we have analyzed the corelative nature of Articles 9 and 6 under GDPR, whereas the second part, available here, focused on detailing the first seven exemptions set forth under Article 9 paragraph (2) letters a) – g) of the GDPR.

On Friday, 8 May 2020, a press release was published on the website of the Romanian Ministry of Public Finance stating that the government had approved the tax amnesty proposed by this ministry. The amnesty includes the waiver of interest, penalties and other charges payable by taxpayers, provided they pay the principal by 15 December 2020.

Noerr has advised the Bauer Media Group on the sale of its Romanian publishing business to Ringier.

This part of our series about “The conundrums of processing special categories of personal data under the General Data Protection Regulation” follows the first article of the series, in which we discussed the correlation between Articles 6 and 9 of the GDPR.

In the context of the state of emergency brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic, declared on Romanian territory since 16 March 2020, the Romanian authorities have tried to come to the aid of economic operators and certain categories of professionals. They have ordered a series of measures meant to balance the distribution of risks in their activities, so as to diminish the impact suffered.

The evolution of the national and international epidemiological situation determined by the COVID-19 outbreak, along with the establishment of the state of emergency within the territory of Romania on March 16, 2020 and the subsequent extension for another 30 days of the same, determined the Romanian Government to adopt a series of new tax measures, mainly aimed at increasing the cash flow both at the level of public and private entities.

Romanian lawyer Zsuzsa Csiki, Ukrainian lawyer Iryna Nikolayevska, and Czech lawyer Karla Rundtova have been promoted to Partner at Kinstellar.

Furtuna si Asociatii has represented the Romanian Airport Services handling company before the Romanian Competition Council regarding the abuse of dominant position investigation of the Avram Iancu Cluj International Airport.

Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (“GDPR”) aims at introducing concepts and rules to strengthen the protection of fundamental rights and freedoms of natural persons in respect of data processing activities. The question has been raised on whether and how the GDPR achieves this in relation to special categories of personal data, with opinions expressed as far as to question whether a specific regime for such categories of data is still adequate when we all agree that there may be not the data itself that is special or sensitive but rather its use.

In the context of the new Covid-19 pandemic spread worldwide, the need to ensure medical equipment services is among the priorities in Romania. In this respect, on April 8, 2020, was published the Order of the Minister of Health no. 566/2020[1] (“Order 566/2020”), which approves the Methodological Norms for the application of Title XX of Law no. 95/2006 regarding the reform in the health system, for the authorization of activities in the field of medical devices (the “Methodological Norms”).

In the context of the new coronavirus outbreak, numerous legal concerns may arise in connection with the future performance of contractual obligations derived from financing agreements such as credit agreements, leasing agreements and alike.

Popovici Nitu Stoica & Asociatii has advised Libra Internet Bank on its establishment of a partnership with Monesse which will enable Monesse to offer RON-denominated accounts to its Romanian customers.