• BANKING

England and Wales High Court (Commercial Court) Decisions

Kommune & Anor Vs. DEPFA ACS Bank

The Defendants advanced money to the Claimants pursuant to contracts called "swaps" - The Claimants, allegedly invested the money imprudently and sustained massive losses, deny their liability to the bank to repay the advances relying upon a provision in the Norwegian Local Government Act, 1992, which restricts their borrowing powers - Whether the municipalities had the capacity to enter into the contracts as governed by the law of Norway, the law pursuant to which the municipalities are constituted?

The loss to the Defendant has been caused by the circumstance that the Claimants lacked the capacity to enter into the loans, whether in their original or in their amended forms. The Claimants were not constrained by their agreements with the Defendant as to the manner in which they used the amounts advanced, and the performance of the investments has merely provided the occasion for the Claimants to rely upon their lack of capacity. The Defendant has suffered a loss by advancing money to entities which had no capacity to enter into an agreement to borrow and repay that money. It follows that the Claimants are in principle entitled to declaratory relief to the effect that they are not bound by the swap transactions, but this is a Pyrrhic victory.

• INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS

England and Wales High Court (Chancery Division) Decisions

First Conferences Services Ltd Vs. Richard Bracchi & Anor

Claim for injunction filed with regard to transfer of large amounts of the claimants' customer database transferring the details to his domain name and passing off their business as that of the claimants - Whether the claimants are entitled to an injunction and damages by reason of such passing off.

The first defendant acquired the domain name in his capacity as an employee of the claimants. The cost for the same was paid for by the claimants. The same applied to the separate website, the defendant continued to use the domain name for the new business and cut off the domain from the claimants' business by re-branding it as another group. The evidence of the claimants' show that considerable expense and time was spent by the claimants' in generating their database and the first defendant routed information from the computer system of the claimant into his personal e-mail account and uploaded the extractions into a "vertical response" mailing account and performed mailshots and passed it on to his associates. This is a case of extraction and a breach of article 16(1) of the Copyright and Rights in Database Regulations 1997. The evidence drawn is that the first defendant copied the claimants' database.