On 29 May 2018, the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation issued the Decree of the Plenum N 15 where clarified issues concerning regulation of labor relations with employers — individuals both with and without sole proprietors’ status, as well as with employers — small business entity. The Decree clarifies provisions of Chapter 48 and Chapter 48.1 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation dedicated to issues regarding regulation of labor between the abovementioned parties.

On 30 July 2018, the Federal Constitutional Law № 1 FKZ “On amending the Federal Constitutional law „On the Judicial System of the Russian Federation“ and certain Federal Constitutional Laws in regard to creating general jurisdiction courts of cassation and general jurisdiction appellate courts” dated 29 July 2018 was published.

On 19 July amendments to the Federal law “On joint stock companies” (JSC Law) came into effect aiming to fix general principles of internal audit implementation in joint stock companies. Here we describe this and other important changes.

Ministry of Economic Development of the Russian Federation proposed to abolish company winding-up basis that provides for the liquidation of joint stock companies (JSC) and limited liability companies (LLC), while the net asset value is lower than the charter capital amount.

On 1 November 2017 new art. 15.8 of the Federal Law “;On information, information technologies and information security” (hereinafter — the Law on Information) entered into force. It prohibits to provide access to forbidden websites by means of anonymous proxies or VPN services. The Law on Information obliges hosting providers to submit information about owners of anonymizers to Roskomnadzor (The Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology, and Mass Media). The owners of anonymizers have to accede to Register of forbidden websites and to restrict access to websites included in blacklist. In case of non-compliance with the Law on Information, Roskomnadzor can only block such anonymizer.

Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS of Russia) has issued Letter No. АЦ/49132/18 dated 29 June 2018 in which expressed its opinion regarding selling prices for drugs, included in the List of vital and essential drugs (the “Essential drug list”). FAS indicated that these prices, when set by wholesale and retail organizations, shall be dependent on the terms of their purchase.

The procedure of incorporation companies and individual entrepreneurs has been changed since 29 April 2018. Amendments to the Federal law No. 129-ФЗ of 08.08.2001 “On state registration of legal entities and individual entrepreneurs” has come into effect.

Presidium of the FAS Russia in its Clarification dated 21.02.2018 No. 13 “On trade secrets information in the process of investigation of the case on violation of antimonopoly legislation, verification for abidance of antimonopoly legislation, state control for economic concentration” (“Clarification”) notes that such information for which information owner doesn’t establish commercial secrecy regime according to Commercial secret law, isn’t protected by law.

On May 14, 2018 the Federal Law No. 325-FZ dated November 14, 2017 “On amendment to articles 19 and 23 of the Federal Law „On Currency Regulation and Currency Control“ and to the Administrative Offences Code of the Russian Federation» (“the Law”) came into force.

Trade dress becomes an effective tool in fighting against unfair competitors. The scope of its protection is broad: from design of a package to the interior of the cafe. However, since trade dress has been mentioned in the law, neither the antimonopoly nor court authorities have explained how to use it correctly.