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19 February 2025
Issue: 8105 / Categories: Legal News , International , Legal services , Sanctions , Regulatory
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Expect permanent disruption to cross-border deals, warns report

Cross-border deals are becoming more uncertain, costly and challenging for senior in-house counsel at major multinationals.

That’s the thrust of a report, ‘GeoDisruption: balancing gigawatts, gigabytes and gigapowers’, published this week by Lex Mundi, a membership organisation of 150 law firms. It anticipates that global turmoil will increase and will require earlier, more complex legal advice for boards and management teams.

It identifies three key areas of regulation—sanctions, which can create hidden risks within supply chains and generate litigation; geo-economic risk, which can block or delay deals; and supply chain disclosure rules, which increase compliance costs.

Helena Samaha, CEO and president of Lex Mundi, said: ‘One silver lining may be innovation in technology and AI, but legal teams still need structured, high-value, legal risk management support from their law firms.’  

MOVERS & SHAKERS

Thackray Williams—Lucy Zhu

Thackray Williams—Lucy Zhu

Dual-qualified partner joins as head of commercial property department

Morgan Lewis—David A. McManus

Morgan Lewis—David A. McManus

Firm announces appointment of next chair

Burges Salmon—Rebecca Wilsker

Burges Salmon—Rebecca Wilsker

Director joins corporate team from the US

NEWS
What safeguards apply when trust corporations are appointed as deputy by the Court of Protection? 
Disputing parties are expected to take part in alternative dispute resolution (ADR), where this is suitable for their case. At what point, however, does refusing to participate cross the threshold of ‘unreasonable’ and attract adverse costs consequences?
When it comes to free legal advice, demand massively outweighs supply. 'Millions of people are excluded from access to justice as they don’t have anywhere to turn for free advice—or don’t know that they can ask for help,' Bhavini Bhatt, development director at the Access to Justice Foundation, writes in this week's NLJ
When an ex-couple is deciding who gets what in the divorce or civil partnership dissolution, when is it appropriate for a third party to intervene? David Burrows, NLJ columnist and solicitor advocate, considers this thorny issue in this week’s NLJ
NLJ's latest Charities Appeals Supplement has been published in this week’s issue
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