Member News, News

Pepper Hamilton Tax Alert Fiscal Cliff Tax Changes

On New Year's Day 2013, the "American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012" (the Act) was enacted to avoid the impact of automatic "fiscal cliff" tax increases. The Act, effective January 1, 2013, retains and makes permanent the Bush-era income tax rates for all but high-income taxpayers, makes permanent the current estate tax exemption with a slight increase in the marginal estate tax rate, and makes important business tax changes. The elimination of "sunset" provisions in the income and estate tax should...

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Chapter News, News

Ambassador Vale de Almeida Highlights Potential of EU-U.S. Cooperation in 2013

Looking ahead to 2013, Ambassador João Vale de Almeida, Head of the European Union Delegation to the U.S., said he sees great potential for further EU-U.S. cooperation on foreign policy and economic matters, building upon the strong transatlantic ties. "I am very confident that in the the year to follow, the European Union and the United States will work together to promote growth and jobs across the Atlantic," said Ambassador Vale de Almeida in his New Year's video message. "We...

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Member News, News

CFPB UPDATE: Attorney-Client Privilege Discussion: Senate Passes Bill This Week

On November 14, 2012, Pepper Hamilton attorneys Richard P. Eckman and Stephen G. Harvey conducted a webinar entitled "Is the Attorney-Client Privilege Under Attack by the CFPB?" to review a new rule by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to codify protections for privileged information submitted to it by the financial institutions it regulates. The rule follows the CFPB's announced expectation that, upon request, the entities the CFPB supervises will disclose privileged material to it. The U.S. Senate passed a bill...

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Chapter News, News

French-American Foundation 2013 Young Leaders Selection Process Opens

The French-American Foundation is pleased to announce the opening of the 2013 Young Leaders selection process! The Young Leaders program, the flagship program of the French-American Foundation, was created in 1981 to foster a new network of trans-Atlantic leaders. Since its inception, the program has taken small groups of carefully selected up-and-coming leaders in government, business, media, the military and the non-profit sector and provided them with the opportunity to spend five days together two years in a row, once...

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Member News, News

GDLSK ALERT: CPSC Issues Final Rule Amending Regulations on Testing and Certification of Children’s Products

The Consumer Product Safety Commission (“CPSC”) has issued a final rule which amends its regulations on testing and labeling pertaining to certification of children’s products. Specifically, the final rule requires the selection of “representative” samples of children’s products for periodic testing by accredited third party testing labs. The final rule is effective on February 8, 2013 and applies to products manufactured after that date. The CPSC defines a representative sample “as one that provides the manufacturer with a basis for inferring...

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Member News, News

Pepper Hamilton Client Alert: Rule 10b5-1 Stock Trading Plans Are Not Bulletproof

Client Alert: December 17, 2012 Jay A. Dubow | dubowjpepperlaw.com Many corporate executives rely on Rule 10b5-1 plans to buy or sell shares of their company's stock without having to worry about violating insider trading laws, even when the trades take place when the executive possesses material nonpublic information about his or her company. However, recent Wall Street Journal articles have described civil and criminal investigations into possible misuse of Rule 10b5-1 plans by executives at a number of companies. Read more  

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Chapter News, News

U.S. District Court Rebuffs ICI Challenge to CFTC Rule 4.5 Amendments

Financial Services Alert - Compliments of EACC New York Founding Member Pepper Hamilton LLP On December 12, 2012, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia released its decision in Investment Company Institute v. U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission rebuffing the Investment Company Institute (ICI)'s and U.S. Chamber of Commerce (Chamber)'s efforts to overturn recently adopted Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) amendments to CFTC Rules 4.5 (exclusion from definition of commodity pool operator) (CPO) and 4.27 (CPO and CTA reporting...

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Chapter News, News

ESMA Guidelines on Repo Arrangements for UCITS

The European Securities and Markets Authority (“ESMA”) has published its Final Report on Guidelines on repurchase and reverse repurchase agreements (the “Final Guidelines”) for UCITS. The Final Report which includes a Feedback Statement, contains an annex detailing the Final Guidelines. The main aim of the Final Guidelines is the protection of investors through the introduction of requirements on using repurchase and reverse repurchase agreements. The main features of the Final Guidelines are as follows: A UCITS that enters into a repurchase agreement...

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Chapter News, News

Cooperation Agreement between Switzerland and EU regarding AIFs

A Cooperation Agreement has been approved between the European Securities and Markets Authority (“ESMA”) and the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (“FINMA”). ESMA negotiated this on behalf of all 27 European Union (“EU”) authorities for securities markets regulation in order to fulfil the pre-condition under the Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive (“AIFMD”) to provide for third party access to EU markets and to allow for fund management delegation. The main aspects of the Cooperation Agreement are: the supervision by the EU and...

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