According to JPM Senior Partner Jelena Gazivoda, Serbian law firms are doing well these days. "We are all very busy these past few months, which is good,” she says. "Notwithstanding the fact that there are different comments in newspapers, we are not really feeling any bad signs. In fact, we are all participating in some significant transactions, making us really busy.”

“The legal market in Poland is a bit challenging right now,” says Linklaters Partner Janusz Dzianachowski. “It's growing very fast and is quite dynamic. We see loads of new clients, which means new work – but also more competition.” According to Dzianachowski, more and more law firms are branding themselves “experts” in the field, but this does not “affect long-present, established firms.”

Giedre Dailidenaite, Partner at Primus Derling in Vilnius, says the recent news in the Lithuanian legal community involves FinTech regulations, “in particular involving the difficulties FinTech businesses are facing with anti-money laundering and data protection issues.”

Coming less than a week before the country’s general elections, the Greek Parliament’s July 1, 2019 adoption of a new Penal Code and new Code of Criminal Procedure were quite controversial, says Ilias Anagnostopoulos, Managing Partner at the Anagnostopoulos law firm. 

There are a number of significant legislative changes in Russia, says Alrud Senior Partner Vassily Rudomino, citing the strengthening of competition regulations in digital markets and new data protection laws as among the major ones. 

“The political situation in Albania is currently overcharged,” says Wolf Theiss Partner Sokol Nako, commenting on the opposition’s decision to leave the parliament earlier this year, which led to widespread protests.

According to Alterna Partner Annika Vait, on July 1, 2019, Estonia enacted more than 25 legal acts, “changing the current legislation.”

“The biggest problem now in Turkey is the ongoing elections,” says Sezer & Utkaner Executive Partner Nazli Sezer, who points out that the country has been in election mode for three years now.

“The main thing right now is the upcoming amendment to Act on Corporations,“ starts Kinstellar Partner Tomas Cihula, describing the situation in the Czech Republic. “The Parliament is considering proposals which seek to clarify some parts of the current legislative framework and that aim to ease the regulatory burden companies are facing.“ Cihula said that this overhaul was met with “approval from the business sector.“

“It has been busy in the business arena,” says Marko Ketler, Senior Partner and Attorney at Law in cooperation with Karanovic & Partners, citing ongoing consolidation in banking sector with the potential sale of Abanka, the third largest bank in Slovenia, and recent major M&A transactions, including the sale of Intereuropa, the largest Slovenian logistics company, to Posta Slovenije. "We can expect a busy summer with several large M&A deals pending."

“Belarusian markets are abuzz with two things right now,” explains Arzinger & Partner’s Klim Stashevsky.“The new strategy for attracting FDI and the M10 highway reconstruction project.”

Divjak, Topic Bahtijarevic Partner Mario Krka says that “there are currently three major legislative changes that everybody in Croatia is talking about: changes to the Corporate Law Act, certain tax bylaws amendments, and upcoming changes to the Civil Procedure Act.”

“Things are pretty quiet, and there aren’t any big developments,” begins Sead Miljkovic of Miljkovic & Partners, when asked for the Buzz in Bosnia & Herzegovina. He reports that “infrastructural projects and consolidations in the bank sector” are active at the moment, as well as “financing of public projects,” but he adds that “none of it is large-scale."

“We are living in historic times,” says Janos Toth, Wolf Theiss Partner in Hungary. “Not only our legal system is transforming, but also a whole new approach to business is evolving.”

Schoenherr Sofia Managing Partner Alexandra Doytchinova starts by talking about what’s happening — or rather, what’s not happening — in the Bulgarian legal market. “Nothing has moved,” she says, "which is not surprising, because Bulgaria is very conservative in this respect. Firms splitting and merging happens once in five years, if at all. So there’s nothing happening there on this front.”

Dorda Partner Martin Brodey starts his provision of The Buzz in Austria by describing the market as very busy and reporting that “two things are blossoming in particular – transactions and litigation – which we see from practice as very strong.” He notes that “Austria is mainly oriented towards the export of highly specialized industrial products and the provision of high-skill services,” and that “this keeps business busy - transactions are stable and flourishing.”

"You know that there are quite a lot of things happening in Ukraine now,” says Vadim Medvedev, Partner at Avellum in Kyiv, who begins by talking about the recent election in April of Volodymyr Zelensky to the Ukrainian Presidency. “Everyone is looking forward to the inauguration to see what changes in policies may follow, Medvedev says, while pointing out that, although Zelensky has asked for May 19, the specific date has not been scheduled yet. He explains that outgoing President Petro Poroshenko was considered to be a “'business-as-usual' candidate,” but the business community is uncertain about Zelensky’s plans, “as there are a lot of gray areas and open issues with respect to his policies and programs — it’s simply unclear.”

While Romania awaits the EU parliamentary elections scheduled for May 2019 and the Presidential elections at the end of this year, Stratulat Albulescu’s Managing Partner Silviu Stratulat is not holding out much hope for significant changes in the country.