This new edition covers legislative developments since the previous edition, including:
miscellaneous amendments made to the Companies Ordinance (Cap.622) by the Companies (Amendment) (No.2) Ordinance 2018 (35 of 2018), including expansion of simplified reporting for corporate groups and alignment of certain concepts with the latest accounting standards; reforms in the regulation of auditors, including the expanded regulatory role of the renamed Accounting and Financial Reporting Council, as introduced by the Financial Reporting Council (Amendment) Ordinance 2019 (3 of 2019) and Financial Reporting Council (Amendment) Ordinance 2021 (41 of 2021); the phased commencement of the new regime under Part 2 and Part 12 of the Companies Ordinance, together with new subsidiary legislation, for protecting the privacy of directors’ residential addresses and identification numbers of directors and others in the Companies Register and in companies’ own registers of directors. This text also includes new cases decided since the last edition, including discussion and analysis of major case law developments both in Hong Kong and overseas common law jurisdictions. Highlights include: UK developments in the law on piercing of the corporate veil, including the UK Supreme Court decision of Hurstwood Properties (A) Ltd v Rossendale Borough Council [2021] 2 WLR 1125; developments in case law on directors’ duties, including the duty to take into account creditors’ interests when a company is insolvent (BTI 2014 LLC v Sequana SA [2022] UKSC 25), directors’ duties imposed on parent companies as shadow directors (Cyberworks Audio Video Technology Ltd v Mei Ah (HK) Co Ltd [2020] HKCFI 398) and duty of care of non-executive directors (Moulin Global Eyecare Holdings Ltd v Lee Sin Mei Olivia [2019] 3 HKLRD 833); major developments in members’ remedies, including restatement of the no reflective loss principle by the UK Supreme Court in Marex Financial Ltd v Sevilleja [2021] AC 39, and Hong Kong Court of Appeal decisions on the common law derivative action (Wang Pengying v Ng Wing Fai [2021] 1 HKLRD 997) and the power to order damages under the statutory injunction remedy (Re L&A International Holdings Ltd [2020] 4 HKLRD 544); further clarification on the principles of corporate attribution in the UK — Singularis Holdings Ltd v Daiwa Capital Markets Ltd [2020] AC 1189; decisions of the Court of Final Appeal in Re Hsin Chong Construction Co Ltd (2021) 24 HKCFAR 98 on void dispositions of company property and Shandong Chenming Paper Holdings Ltd v Arjowiggins HKK 2 Ltd [2022] HKCFA 11 on winding up of foreign companies, as well as further Court of First Instance decisions developing the common law principles on the granting of assistance to foreign insolvency office-holders, including for corporate rescue purposes.
