The Ministry of Justice has changed, as of 1 April 2012, the nature of extracts from the internet version of the Commercial Register which are no longer only informative but have an official form, while the same applies to extracts in PDF format which can be downloaded or printed from the application at no costs.

The Ministry of Justice further introduced a new web application allowing submission of applications for registration of data with the Commercial Register, while providing an intelligent verification of correctness of data input, thus, preventing the Register Court from summoning the applicant to complete the application.

 

 

The Cabinet discusses a proposal of Act on Enhancement of Transparency of Joint-Stock Companies. The aim of the Act is to regulate anonymous ownership of stocks so that state authorities and bodies involved in criminal proceedings could identify a company´s stockholders. The new regulation is supposed to improve the transparency of business relations and limit corruption. The new Act imposes on joint-stock companies with bearer shares the obligation to choose between various ways of transformation of bearer shares, such as change into registered shares, immobilization (deposition in a bank which maintains the account of a stockholder) or booking of shares with the Central Securities Depository. The aim of such meaures is to allow identification of a shareholder at any time. Though, the new Act intends to limit anonymous ownership of bearer shares, it does not ban the bearer shares as form of a security.

The Office for the Protection of Competition may penalise the effects of a world-wide cartel produced in the Czech Republic before its accession to the EU. The Court of Justice issued a decision on 14 February 2012 in a case of cartel agreement between manufacturers of the so-called gas insulated switchgear who were setting up prices in the period between 1998 and 2004 which they, subsequently, offered in public tenders on supply of such products. The European Commission as well as the Office for the Protection of Competition examined the cartel and imposed penalties on the companies concerned. The main question was whether both competition authorities did not penalise the same conduct and therefore could have infringed the ne bis in idem (the prohibition of double punishment for the same conduct) principle. According to the Court of Justice, the abovementioned principle has not been infringed because the Office for the Protection of Competition penalised only the consequences of the cartel that have been produced in the territory of the Czech Republic before 1 May 2004, which the Commission did not take into account while imposing its sanctions. The decisions of the Office for the Protection of Competition and the Commission did not concern same effects of the identified conduct and, therefore, the prohibited accumulation of sanctions could not have occurred. The case will now be further dealt with by Regional Court in Brno which filed the preliminary question to the Court of Justice.