In November 2021, the Green Debt Instrument and the Green Lease Certificate Guidelines Draft [the “Draft Guide”] was submitted to the public opinion. The draft was approved and published with the Principal Decision of the Turkey’s Capital Markets Board [“CMB”] dated February 24, 2022 and numbered 10/296, with some revisions made as per the comments by the market actors.

Turkish Commercial Code No. 6102 (“TCC”) sets forth that in accordance with the articles of association or by changing the articles of association, general assembly of shareholders of a joint stock company may decide to issue dividend right certificates in favor of the owners, creditors or those related to the company for a similar reason. In this article, we will focus on the purpose and types of dividend right certificates within the framework of Article 348, 502 and 503 of the TCC.

Succession is essentially the passing of the legator's personal assets during their lifetime to the estate, subject to joint ownership upon the legator’s death, and then to individual heirs. Prior to the death of the legator, the legator preserves all of their property rights, while the future heirs do not attain heirdom, let alone any rights on legator’s property. The titles of legator and heir are gained only upon the death of a person, and from then on, the heirs are entitled to the inheritance. For this reason, the most contentious aspects of inheritance law are succession, which is the transfer of the inheritance and possible interventions to the heirs’ inheritance shares.

On January 19, 2022, Turkish Competition Authority (“Authority”) has published a highly anticipated decision of the Competition Board (“Board”) regarding the investigation against retail grocery chains and suppliers of such chains, active in the fields of retail food and cleaning products (“Investigation”). The Investigation involved leading global suppliers of food and cleaning products such as Henkel, Unilever, Nestle, Johnson & Johnson, Procter & Gamble and Nivea as well as almost all retailers active in fast moving consumer goods (“FMCG”) business in Turkey including but not limited to the major players such as BİM Birleşik Mağazalar A.Ş. (“BİM”), CarrefourSA Carrefour Sabancı Ticaret Merkezi A.Ş. (“Carrefour”), Migros Ticaret A.Ş. (“Migros”) and Yeni Mağazacılık A.Ş. (“A101”).

Former Cakmak Partner Kemal Aksel has joined the International Finance Corporation - the private sector finance arm of the World Bank.

Following the launch of a military operation against Ukraine by the Russian Federation; EU, US, UK and several other countries began imposing broad economic sanctions against Russia. Another recent and critical sanctions is the European Council’s decision and regulation of March 2, 2022, which removes 7 Russian banks from the SWIFT system.

In Turkey, 2021 continued to be dominated by the COVID-19 pandemic and the various legal difficulties and ambiguities that it brought. This raised several questions on how to apply the Turkish data protection law and related legislation, in particular about how to properly process data on health, vaccination status, and PCR tests.

Despite uncertainty due to the pandemic, the pace of merger activity in Turkey has not decreased and merger control is still one of the Turkish Competition Authority’s (TCA) key enforcement areas. The Law on Protection of Competition (Competition Law) amendment in June 2020 was a milestone for merger control in Turkey as it changed the substantive test for assessment of mergers. Below are some observations regarding the adoption of the new test and the TCA’s recent approach to merger control and remedies.

Crowdfunding is a new generation funding and investment system which allows different individuals to invest in a project in exchange for shares or interest. Crowdfunding offers an alternative funding market that creates a win-win situation for entrepreneurs and investors.

Turkey is the world’s tenth largest agricultural producer and a hub for many top global players in food production. The country is accelerating the integration of sustainability principles into the sector’s growth strategies.

It is not often that a CEE law firm decides to expand beyond the borders of its home market. Seeking out clients abroad and maintaining a standard of quality service is not only taxing but may also prove harmful – if not planned correctly.

When much was happening around the world, especially with the global pandemic, we decided to start our firm – Guleryuz & Partners – in September 2020. We made a major investment ignoring all the current challenges, including COVID-19 and the sluggish Turkish economy.

After the Russian Federation had launched a military operation against Ukraine; the U.S., the EU, the UK, and a number of other countries began imposing broad economic sanctions against Russia. Those imposed by the United States are among the most economically effective sanctions.

One of the most important inventions of the 21st century is undoubtedly the COVID-19 vaccine, with respect to its affirmative effect on public health. Before its invention, humanity had been battling a substantial rise in the number of COVID-19 cases, and the vaccine managed to raise hopes of controlling the pandemic. Likewise, Turkey, especially the Turkish Ministry of Health, has taken a lot of steps towards having individuals become more conscious of the importance of vaccination, in an effort to decrease the number of cases. Recently, the total number of shots administered has reached more than 119 million.

An intermediary service provider is defined in Law No. 6563 on the Regulation of Electronic Commerce ["E-Commerce Law"] as "natural or legal persons that provide an electronic environment where others can conduct financial and commercial activities.” Electronic commerce platforms such as n11, Trendyol, GittiGidiyor, and Amazon, which are among the most important actors of electronic commerce today, are included in this definition under our legislation. In essence, these platforms mediate the contract's conclusion and performance by bringing buyers and sellers together via the internet. In this article, the liabilities of e-commerce actors as "intermediary service providers" will be discussed in light of recent Court of Cassation decisions.

Pursuant to the Protocol No. 15 amending the European Convention on Human Rights ["ECHR / Convention"], the time-limit for the application to the European Court of Human Rights ["ECtHR"] was reduced from 6 months to 4 months, effective as of February 1, 2022. Accordingly, once remedies available as per domestic laws are exhausted, the application should be filed with the ECtHR within 4 months following the final court judgment. Having said that if the court decision was adopted before February 1, 2022, the ECtHR application based on this decision will still be subject to 6-month time-limit.

On December 9, 2021, the Turkish Competition Authority (“Authority”) published its report entitled “Analysis Report on the Financial Technologies in Payment Services” (“Report”) which evaluates the effect of the use of financial technologies (“Fintech”) in the financial sector, the obstacles to innovation and competition in the relevant markets and the entry of big technology (“Big Tech”) companies (e.g., Facebook, Amazon, Google, Apple) into the market. The Report notes that Fintech includes: (i) innovative products and services that emerged in the financial sector as a result of the radical technological transformation, (ii) new entrants other than the incumbent players that offer these services, and (iii) Big Tech companies which started to offer financial services.

“Regulation on the Principles of the Asset, Right and Receivable Inquiry on the National Judiciary Informatics System” [“Regulation”] was published in the Official Gazette dated January 22, 2022 and entered into force on the same date. The Regulation basically sets forth the procedures and principles regarding the inquiry of the debtor's assets, rights and receivables via the information systems integrated into the National Judiciary Informatics System [the so-called "UYAP"].