A new amendment to the Hungarian Anti-Money Laundering Act seeks to extend its scope to custodian wallet providers and virtual currency exchange platforms, in order to reduce the risks associated to cryptocurrencies. The proposal is currently before the Hungarian Parliament, and aims at fulfilling Hungary’s obligations deriving from the 5th Anti-Money Laundering Directive (“Directive”).

Csaba Vari has joined Baker McKenzie Hungary to head up the Privacy division of the office's Intellectual Property and Technology group.

On 23 October 2019 the European Commission published a report on the third annual review on the functioning of the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield. The report states that the U.S. continues to ensure an adequate level of protection for personal data transferred under the Privacy Shield from the EU to participating companies in the U.S. Today approx. 5,000 companies are participating in this EU-U.S. data protection framework.

Former Baker McKenzie Budapest Head of IT/Communications Adam Liber and Attorney Tamas Bereczki have left that firm to become partners at the new Provaris Varga & Partners law firm in Budapest, led by former KNP Law Partner Istvan Varga.

The organic development of the Hungarian insolvency laws was interrupted by the era of the socialist planned economy, which ended in 1990. The novel Insolvency Act of 1991 (IA) may have satisfactorily served the economy in the first years of the transition period, but due to the profound changes in the socio-economic environment in subsequent years, the statute has become obsolete. Successive governments over the past three decades have made multiple efforts to keep the IA up-to-date and to follow the numerous demands made by the various players of the market and interested legal professionals, but the more than one hundred (!) amendments have rendered the system opaque and relatively difficult to use.

Hungary’s Danubia Patent and Law Office traces its roots back almost three quarters of a century. Danubia Partners Eszter Szakacs and Zsofia Klauber explain how the firm has managed to stay on top of the market for so long, through significant periods of technological, political, legal, and historical transformation in the country and culture around it.

If you decide to apply for bank financing, you will need to consider not only the financial terms of the loan but also whether you are ready to allow the bank to access your assets as collateral. It will probably ask for the following guarantees.

Lakatos, Koves & Partners has advised the Indotek Group on its acquisition of Hungary's Miskolc Plaza, Duna Plaza, Gyor Plaza, and Corvin Plaza shopping centers from Klepierre. Kinstellar advised the sellers.

When it comes to instances of compensation, this is not always the case. The European Court of Justice (ECJ) has recently reiterated that compensation for damages or contractual penalties may also qualify as consideration for a service for the purposes of VAT. This is important because consideration (i.e. the price of a service) is subject to VAT, whereas compensation is not. This could affect so-called loyalty periods or other fixed-term services in particular.

DLA Piper has advised Vanessa Research and its Hungarian subsidiary on a change of ownership and company structure. The sell-side of the transaction was reportedly advised by Zsolt Szita and Lanchidi & Partners.

The Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU) recently dealt with "appropriate compensation" due in cases where a preliminary injunction based on IP rights was lifted or not rectified in subsequent main proceedings.

Kinstellar, Soltysinski Kawecki & Szlezak, and Cobalt have advised Stada Arzneimittel on the acquisition of Walmark from Mid Europa Partners. White & Case and Weil, Gotshal & Manges reportedly advised the sellers on the deal.

Former EY Law Attorney Laszlo Krupl has joined Schoenherr Budapest as Head of Real Estate.

Gabor Horvath, former Senior Legal Counsel & Ethics Officer at GDF Suez, has joined the Kapolyi Law Firm as Head of Corporate/M&A.

Former Wolf Theiss Poland Co-Managing Partner Ron Given has joined Deloitte Legal as its CE Senior Legal Counsel, responsible for all of the firm’s offices in 19 Central and Eastern European countries.

One does not simply walk into the courtroom and hope for the best. To win a civil case you will need to navigate through the strict formalities that were introduced by the new Hungarian civil procedure code. It closed many well-known paths of litigation tactics and antics but also opened up new possibilities.

Budapest's HP Legal has announced that Reka Versics will be promoted to the firm's partnership on January 1, 2020.

Under a non-compete agreement, the employer may restrict the ex-employee’s business activity for a period of maximum 2 years following the termination of employment and in exchange, the employer shall pay adequate compensation to the employee - the amount of which may not be less than 1/3 of the base wage due for the same period. The Hungarian Supreme Court (Curia) published in September 2019 a report on the judicial practice relating to non-compete agreements, which highlights the following findings: