With international trade rarely making the news in this era of stable foreign relations and respectful international dialogue, you can be forgiven if you are unaware that Canada has entered several trade agreements that require it to protect trade secrets. But can Canada be forgiven for never actually enacting trade secret legislation? Maybe we can because of Canada’s substitute: the common law action for “breach of confidence”.

With two decisions (No. 1895/2018 and No. 1896/2018), both filed on 25 January 2018, the Court of Cassation reached opposite conclusions in the two different situations

The case

The Constitutional Court (6 December 2017) confirmed that Art. 147, para. 5, of the Italian Bankruptcy Law does not violate the Constitution as long as it is interpreted in a broad sense

The case

With the decision No. 1195 of 18 January 2018, the Court of Cassation ruled on the powers of the extraordinary commissioner to require performance of pending contracts and on the treatment of the relevant claims of the suppliers

The case

Over the last year, several court decisions have touched on the legislative conflict between taxation authorities and secured creditors in insolvency situations.

In a recent decision that is relevant to oil and gas receiverships, the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench lifted a stay of proceedings against an insolvent operator to allow the non-operating party to enforce its right to take over operatorship pursuant to the CAPL 2007 Operating Procedure.

The Court of Cassation with a decision of 25 September 2017, No. 22274 confirms that Art. 74 of the Italian Bankruptcy Law provides a special rule, which does not apply to cases to which it is not explicitly extended

The case

With the decision No. 1649 of 19 September 2017 the Court of Appeals of Catania followed the interpretation according to which a spin-off is not subject to the avoiding powers of a bankruptcy receiver

The case

The Supreme Court of Cassation (19 October 2017, No. 24682) discerns the respective scope of application of the criteria for the liquidation of compensation to the lawyer in case there was no specific agreement between the parties

The case

We previously published Part 1 of our survey of interesting and important developments in Canadian insolvency and restructuring matters in 2017. This post is the second and final part – with an additional seven highlights and cases. You can also find a printable version containing the complete “Top Insolvency Cases and Highlights from 2017” bulletin on our website.