新闻和见解

Our Intellectual Property Partner Jevon Louis has recently contributed to the Legal 500 Comparative Guides 2025: Intellectual Property – Singapore chapter.

We are thrilled to announce that Shook Lin & Bok continues to achieve strong results across seven practice areas in the 2025-2026 edition of IFLR1000, reinforcing our position as a leading law firm in Singapore. In particular, our market-leading Banking and Finance practice has achieved a Tier 1 ranking and our Financial Services Regulatory practice has been newly recognised in the latest IFLR1000 edition. These accomplishments underscore our unwavering commitment and continuous improvement in delivering top-tier legal services.

The National Environment Agency (“NEA”) recently announced that carbon tax-liable companies will be allowed to roll over into 2025 their unused limit of eligible international carbon credits (“EICCs”) from 2024. This decision arose out of the current limited supply of such credits. This update explains what EICCs are, how they work under the Carbon Pricing Act 2018 (“CPA”), the process of sourcing and obtaining them, and the key issues these companies should be aware of—including the present constraints, regulatory uncertainties, and implications.

[Private Banking Disputes – Bank’s exercise of discretion to reduce value of client’s collateral]

In Deutsche Bank AG Singapore Branch v ARJ Holding Ltd and another [2025] SGHC 163, the Singapore High Court affirmed the claimant bank’s entitlement to reduce the value of the collateral in the portfolio of its client (the 1st defendant), resulting in a shortfall in the 1st defendant’s accounts. When the shortfall was not regularized, the claimant bank terminated the 1st defendant’s loan facilities and demanded full repayment of the 1st defendant’s loans.

Amongst other findings on the factual disputes, the Singapore High Court affirmed that there was an implied term of good faith in law to the bank’s exercise of its absolute discretion as contractually provided for, in that the claimant bank had to exercise its contractual discretion in a manner that is not arbitrary, capricious or perverse. On the facts, the Singapore High Court was satisfied that this implied term of good faith had not been breached by the claimant bank.

In Envy Asset Management Pte Ltd (in liquidation) and others v. Lau Lee Sheng and others [2025] SGHC 144 (the “Envy Employee Suit”), the General Division of the Singapore High Court delivered another pivotal judgment in the ongoing saga surrounding Singapore’s largest Ponzi scheme to date.

In the largest monetary judgment arising from the Envy Companies’ fraudulent nickel trading scheme to-date, the Court in Envy Asset Management Pte Ltd (in liquidation) and others v. Ng Yu Zhi and others [2025] SGHC 143 (the “Envy Main Suit”), amongst others, ordered two of the Envy Companies’ former directors to pay more than S$ 900 million in aggregate damages as compensation for, amongst others, breach of their directors’ duties.

UMS Integration Limited’s (“UMS Integration”) secondary listing on the Main Market of Bursa Malaysia Securities Berhad (“Bursa Securities”) marks the first secondary listing of a Singapore-listed company on the Main Market of Bursa Securities. For Singapore-incorporated entities maintaining a primary listing on the Singapore Exchange Securities Trading (“SGX-ST”), pursuing a secondary listing on the Main Market of Bursa Securities invites an opportunity to tap into Malaysia’s investor base.

On 23 July 2025, the International Court of Justice (“ICJ”) issued its Advisory Opinion (“AO”) in respect of two questions on the obligations of States under international law to ensure the protection of the climate system and other parts of the environment from anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases; and the legal consequences under these obligations for States where they, by their acts and omissions, have caused significant harm to the climate system and other parts of the environment. The AO impacts Singapore businesses and will likely raise their regulatory risk.

On 15 May 2025, the Singapore Exchange Regulation (“SGX RegCo”) issued a consultation paper outlining amendments to certain areas of the regulatory framework, including a shift towards a more disclosure-based regime. This article examines the key reforms proposed by SGX RegCo to enhance the development of Singapore's equity capital markets, and the underlying rationales driving some of the key reforms. Finally, the article outlines what investors, listing applicants and issuers can expect from the SGX RegCo’s proposed reforms in the coming years before concluding.

Click here to view the article.