Which law governs assets recorded on the blockchain? This question has long eluded legal academia and practice. Now, states have begun to enact hard and fast rules. This contribution compares legislative provisions of a number of states and a recently adopted text by UNIDROIT. The analysis of these rules shows the emergence of a new gulf in the conflict of laws. This gap must be overcome before the differences are further entrenched and reciprocated by other states which have not yet regulated the question. The means to do so is a uniform text of conflict of laws. An attempt will be made to distill an “ideal” conflicts rule for digital assets from the existing provisions. The proposal made here can serve as a blueprint for national legislation or case law. It is hoped that it will lead to a worldwide consensus in determining the law applicable to digital assets.

This article examines the emergence of the remedial constructive trust in Singapore, and the consequential need to rethink the distinction between personal and proprietary claims. The focus will be on the implications of the constructive trust for the insolvency or bankruptcy regime.

This article surveys the attitude of Commonwealth courts to extraterritorial jurisdiction. it points out that whereas other Commonwealth courts favour the exercise of extraterritorial jurisdiction, courts in Malaysia and Singapore have adhered to a strict view based on the territoriality principle. In the context of the increase in transnational crime, such views should not be maintained. The article argues that existing provisions of the law could be read as admitting the exercise of extraterritorial jurisdiction. If such a course is not followed by the courts, there is an urgent need in this area for legislative reform.

Prior to independence, legal education was all but non-existent in Singapore and many other colonies. This essay briefly discusses that colonial context before going on to describe how the National University of Singapore Faculty of Law came to play an important part in Singapore's rule of law story as Singapore's national law school, a global law school, and an Asian law school. A third section considers challenges for the future, including the impact of technology on legal practice and the changing market for legal services. These transformations require us to rethink the purpose of law school, even as they are matched by changes in the students and faculty who enter our classrooms and our offices.

As the NUS Faculty of Law celebrates 50 years of legal education in Singapore, this article explores some of the likely developments in Singapore legal education in the next few years. The paper suggests that globalisation will mean a greater emphasis on comparative law and more international collaboration amongst law schools. It also suggests that inter-disciplinary perspectives in the study of law will become more important, as will skills programmes designed to serve as vehicles to develop both practical and higher order thinking skills. A student-centric teaching pedagogy will remain important although resource constraints may lead to changes in the teaching methods used. The paper also opines that with globalisation, there is a growing awareness of what teaching best practices in legal education are and this will lead to calls for reform in the many parts of the world where law teaching is of poor quality.

This article examines the tax status of partnerships under the Singapore Income Tax Act. The author considers the common law and statutory rules respecting the formation of partnerships, with particular reference to the use of a partnership as an income-splitting device. Calculation of income at the partnership level and the rules for taxing income in the hands of the individual partners are also considered. The tax advantages of the partnership form are reviewed. _x000D_ The administrative mechanism for collecting taxes from partners is also examined, with particular reference to the position where some partners default on their tax obligations respecting partnership income. The position of non-resident partners of a Singapore partnership is also considered.