Mealey's International Arbitration : Mealey's : Legal News & Analysis

Mealey's International Arbitration

November 14, 2023
Creditors Say High Court Need Not Review Venezuela, Oil Company’s Alter-Ego Status

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Six creditors urge the U.S. Supreme Court not to grant a petition for a writ of certiorari filed by the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela and its state-owned oil company Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA), writing in an opposition brief that the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals correctly found for the second time that the parties are alter egos and lack sovereign immunity from a planned auction of oil shares to enforce arbitral awards worth nearly $3 billion.
November 08, 2023
Judge: Dubai Arbitration Center’s Replacement Bars Arbitration Of Saudi Dispute

NEW ORLEANS — A Louisiana federal judge denied a motion to dismiss or compel arbitration of a $1.3 million dispute over a Saudi oil and gas project, finding the parties’ arbitration clause unenforceable because their contract provided for arbitration before a Dubai institution the government of Dubai abolished and replaced in 2021.
November 07, 2023
Judge Vacates Tribunal’s Addendum Slashing $4M From $10.5M Gas Well Award

HOUSTON — A Texas federal judge on Nov. 6 granted a U.S. company’s motion to partly confirm and partly vacate two arbitral awards issued in a dispute with a British Virgin Islands (BVI) entity over profits from gas wells in the Republic of Cameroon, finding as the company argued that the tribunal erred in issuing an addendum granting the BVI entity’s request to reduce its original award by more than $4 million.
November 06, 2023
Judge Confirms Chemical Factory Award In Favor Of Dow’s German Subsidiary

NEW YORK — A New York federal judge granted an unopposed petition to confirm a negotiated arbitral award reflecting a settlement between two German entities over their dispute for approximately $7 million in costs required to replace certain equipment at a German chemical factory owned by a subsidiary of Dow Chemical and of which the other party was a tenant.
November 03, 2023
Gabon Account Freeze Order In Pipeline Dispute Harmed Comity, 2nd Circuit Told

NEW YORK — Two Citibank entities in an appellant brief filed with the Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals challenge a New York federal judge’s “unprecedented extraterritorial order” directing them to compel a Gabonese affiliate to freeze a Cameroonian pipeline company’s $151 million account pending the outcome of a shareholder arbitration, writing that the order offends comity and was issued the same day a Gabonese court unfroze the account.
November 02, 2023
Judge OKs 7 Creditors’ Bids To Enforce $3.5B In Judgments Against Venezuela

WILMINGTON, Del. — A Delaware federal judge on Nov. 1 granted motions for writs of attachment filed by seven groups of award-creditors and bondholders seeking to enforce judgments collectively worth roughly $3.5 billion against the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela as part of a planned auction, after finding that Venezuela and its state-owned oil company Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA) are collaterally estopped from denying their alter-ego status.
November 02, 2023
ICSID Orders Peru To Pay Singaporean Investors $115M For Energy Dispute

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) published a tribunal’s award ordering the Republic of Peru to pay more than $115 million to two Singaporean electricity investors after finding that the nation passed a “seriously arbitrary” new regulation harming their investment in power generation.
October 27, 2023
Reinsurer’s Bid For Ex Parte TRO In Arbitration Row Is Sidelined By English Injunction

NEW YORK — A New York federal court case in which a reinsurer sought an ex parte temporary restraining order (TRO) to protect its arbitration rights has been stayed after the respondent obtained an anti-suit injunction from an English court.
October 23, 2023
Nigeria Wins Challenge In English Court To $11B Gas Supply Award Based On Fraud

LONDON — An English judge on Oct. 23 ruled in favor of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and found that an arbitral award against it worth more than $11 billion was procured through “abuses of the arbitral process” including fraud and bribery and due to “serious irregularity” cannot be enforced in favor of an Irish-owned company that brought arbitration over a thwarted gas supply contract entered into in 2010.
October 23, 2023
Chilean Contractor Asks Court To Confirm $139M Award Against Italian Builder

WILMINGTON, Del. — A Chilean contractor filed a petition in Delaware federal court seeking to enforce an arbitral award in its favor worth more than $139 million for a hospital construction contract dispute against an Italian construction company that acquired the bankrupt award-debtor and allegedly accepted liability for the award, writing that the court has jurisdiction based on the presence in Delaware of the Italian company’s U.S. subsidiary.
October 23, 2023
Russia Says Dutch Advocate General’s Opinion Not Final Word On Fraud Claims

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Russian Federation filed a response brief urging a District of Columbia federal judge to disregard a recent advisory opinion of the Dutch Supreme Court’s advocate general, writing that the opinion does not strengthen the claims of shareholders seeking to enforce arbitral awards against Russia worth more than $57 billion and asserting that its claims of fraud in the underlying arbitration remain pending.
September 27, 2023
COMMENTARY: The Approach Of Courts In England & Wales To Violations Of International Public Policy

By Leonor d’Albiousse
October 20, 2023
ICSID Ad Hoc Committee Refuses To Annul 17.7M Euro Award Against Italy

WASHINGTON, D.C. — An International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) ad hoc committee ordered the Italian Republic to pay 807,000 euros in attorney fees and $421,000 in arbitration costs after rejecting in full its application to annul a 17.7 million euro award against it for harming German and Austrian solar power investors by rescinding incentive tariffs upon which the investors relied.
October 20, 2023
Judge Refuses To Deem Zimbabwe’s Appeal In $264M Award Row Frivolous

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A District of Columbia federal judge on Oct. 19 denied two Zimbabwean plantation companies’ motion to certify as frivolous the Republic of Zimbabwe’s interlocutory appeal challenging the denial of its motions to dismiss the plantations’ petition to confirm an arbitral award against it worth more than $264 million, finding that “no binding case” controls the outcome of Zimbabwe’s appeal.
October 20, 2023
11th Circuit: Arbitration Order ‘Is Still Final,’ So Subrogees’ Appeal Continues

ATLANTA — Denying what it construed as a motion to dismiss an appeal concerning an alleged $28 million in damages to an Algerian power plant, an 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel said, “Although the district court deferred the issue of the scope of the arbitration provisions to the arbitrator, its order is still final because it found that the provisions required it to do so.”
October 19, 2023
11th Circuit Vacates Order Restraining $10M To Pay Hong Kong Awards

ATLANTA — An 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel vacated a ruling restraining $10 million held under a Colorado conservatorship to pay a potential judgment confirming arbitral awards issued by a Hong Kong International Arbitration Center (HKIAC) tribunal against the individual under conservatorship and his conservator for failure to repay a litigation funder, finding that the court lacked the power to restrain those funds.
October 19, 2023
Serbia Denies Cypriot, Canadian Investors’ 30M Euro Land Use ICSID Claims

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) on Oct. 18 published the Republic of Serbia’s countermemorial raising jurisdictional and admissibility objections to claims brought against it by Cypriot and Canadian investors who contend that Serbia caused 30 million euros in damages by building traffic infrastructure on land they sought to develop, which Serbia says was within its rights.
October 19, 2023
Split Tribunal Awards Jamaican Investor $43.5M In Dominican Landfill Dispute

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A split International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) tribunal awarded a Jamaican investor more than $43.5 million in damages against the Dominican Republic (DR) for the “indirect creeping expropriation” of his investment in an urban landfill but rejected his claims for damages based on allegedly thwarted plans to build a waste-to-energy (WTE) plant.
October 18, 2023
U.K. Supreme Court: Mozambique Must Arbitrate Bribery Claims Against Developers

LONDON — The United Kingdom Supreme Court ruled that the Republic of Mozambique must arbitrate allegations of bribery against shipbuilding and development entities that it accuses of exposing the nation to a $2 billion liability based on arbitration clauses in the contracts the entities entered into with state-owned investment entities, despite Mozambique’s status as a non-signatory to those contracts.
October 17, 2023
ICSID Won’t Hasten Dead Oil Investor’s Kids’ Claims Against Bulgaria

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) on Oct. 16 published an order denying a request to accelerate the timeline for briefing treaty claims brought against the Republic of Bulgaria by the two children of a dead Lithuanian oil investor, months after deferring a decision on whether the children have standing to bring claims for alleged harms to their father’s investment.
October 17, 2023
Kazakhstan Defends New Suit Seeking Dismissal Of $500M Award For Alleged Fraud

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Republic of Kazakhstan filed a brief in District of Columbia federal court opposing dismissal of its new suit to set aside a judgment confirming an arbitral award worth more than $500 million in favor of two Moldovan investors and their companies, writing that the award is the product of fraud and that relief from judgment is warranted.
October 16, 2023
Supreme Court Grants Certiorari In 2nd Challenge To Chevron Deference

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Oct. 13 granted a petition for a writ of certiorari in a second case challenging the doctrine of Chevron deference and ordered that it be briefed on a schedule allowing argument “in tandem” with a pending case pertaining to the same issue, both of which involve challenges to regulations that require fishing vessels to pay federal monitors.
October 13, 2023
Mining Investor Petitions To Enforce $253M Award Against Bolivia For Expropriation

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A Bermudan investor filed a petition in the District of Columbia federal court to enforce a Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) tribunal’s arbitral award in its favor worth more than $253 million against the Plurinational State of Bolivia for nationalizing its tin mining investments, asserting that there is no basis for the award to not be enforced against Bolivia.
October 12, 2023
En Banc Review Of Jurisdiction Not Needed In $1.3B Award Row, 9th Circuit Told

SAN FRANCISCO — An Indian state-owned company filed a response brief telling the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals it need not grant rehearing en banc of its ruling reversing the confirmation of an arbitral award against the company worth more than $1.3 billion for lack of jurisdiction, as is sought by the liquidated Indian company that won the award and its shareholders, writing that Ninth Circuit precedent on minimum contacts under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA) “is sound.”
October 12, 2023
Insurers Get Arbitration Award Confirmed Against Non-Appearing Reinsurer

FORT WORTH, Texas — Three U.S.-based insurers successfully sought confirmation of an arbitration award against a China-based reinsurer, with a Texas federal judge noting that the reinsurer did not appear in the action.