South China Morning Post
20 December 2015
Hong Kong’s top court recently gave the go-ahead for the parent company of the famous Yung Kee roast goose restaurant in Central to be wound up, despite it being incorporated in the British Virgin Islands.
The landmark ruling clarified local courts’ jurisdiction over foreign companies. Members of the legal fraternity are expecting more similar cases as the city develops into a dispute resolution hub, but questions are also being raised as to how the order will take effect.
“This Court of Final Appeal judgment is instrumental to Hong Kong’s development as a dispute resolution centre,” William Wong Ming-fung SC told the Post. “This is very good for Hong Kong.”
Wong, who specialises in company and insolvency law, said many firms initially incorporated offshore to evade local taxes and conceal identities and assets in tax havens like the BVI...
Dr Maisie Ooi, a company law professor at the University of Hong Kong, said the judgment is “clearly very important” as it sheds light on a cross-border issue not judicially considered before in Hong Kong and elsewhere.
“It is an important decision in a world where corporations and their transactions are increasingly crossing jurisdictional borders,” she said. “The Court of Final Appeal has by this decision clearly signalled that Hong Kong courts are prepared to wind up foreign companies in appropriate cases.”
Ooi said shareholders and their lawyers may look quite keenly to Hong Kong courts to process their petitions. But she wondered how the order can take effect without the cooperation of BVI courts and authorities, when both the company and its sole asset are outside of Hong Kong... Click here to read the full article.
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