For more than a century now, trademark laws have protected the distinctiveness of products and seller identities. A drastic change to those laws, however, seems to be on the way with what has been called the fourth “revolution” of consumer spending – where once products were mediated by the recommendations of a shop owner, before being offered to the customer themselves in groceries stores, and then online, consumer spending now takes places almost completely with reliance on search engines and through programmed bots, in short, via artificial intelligence.

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Moving out of Covid-19, many may have expected more from the digital boom that appeared to be occurring with the emergence of seemingly fully decentralized web platforms (Web3) and 3D virtual world interfaces (the ‘metaverse’). An article recently published in the journal American Affairs posits an unexpected root cause of the stagnation: the professionalization/standardization of the US academic research system.

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As the humanitarian crisis in Venezuela continues to bring millions of refugees into Central and North America, the US has taken the opportunity to announce new refugee intake initiatives. In general, the announcement reflects the US’s intention to overhaul, staff and expand its immigration intake effort with respect to legally processed refugees from Central America. The changes however may also lead to unforeseen consequences to existing migration processes for Central American migrants.

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E-commerce is now a fixture of the business world, if not fast becoming its dominant form of trade. Online sales afford business owners whole new markets and previously unimaginable opportunities to handle with ease multiple enterprises simultaneously. A digital platform however does not remove the obligation of parties in the sale of goods to understand clearly the terms of sale and their rights as the seller and consumer.

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Recent news about the end of FTX cryptocurrency has drawn attention to the risks involved in trading in cryptocurrency. In the case of FTX’s collapse in particular, cryptocurrency’s vulnerability to fraud, mere market speculation and liquidity issues have been writ large. This week we took a look at some of the major risks involved in Crypto investments.

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As discussed in our previous post, we will continue to examine the acceptance rates for various economic visa and immigrant categories in the US this week. As we will discuss in this article, there is a trend towards a high percentage of temporary work visa approvals in the US, while the transition to permanent status is completed successfully for a lower proportion of applicants. This may reflect the difficulty of obtaining permanent residency status in the US for many workers and business people, though the US is still an inviting place for those who wish to temporarily work and do business there.

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Borderless Counsel frequently assists clients with applications for permanent and temporary work visas in the United States. The brief report below aims to capture the recent rates of visa application approvals, and their distribution across continents and countries. We focus in particular on the worker visas most frequently sought after by our clients: the non-immigrant L1-A, L1-B and H-1B visas; and the immigrant/green card EB-1, EB-3, and EB-5 visas. All data was sourced from the U.S. Department of State’s Visa Statistics. In this post we will focus on the H-1 and L-1 Visa categories. In our upcoming post, we will outline visa statistics for the EB-1, EB-3 and EB-5 (green card/permanent residency) categories).

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This article provides cursory advice to foreign and domestic applicants for Canadian visas on their options for continuing to seek a Canadian visa should their application be refused by immigration authorities. In particular, the blog aims to equip rejected visa applicants with a sense of the time, costs, and complexities of various appeals and re-application processes.

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Trademark protection in international territories significantly increases the export potential of businesses and their competitiveness in international markets. Business owners seeking to expand should be aware that they can now benefit from a globalized trademark registration agreement that enables them to file for trademark protection in multiple jurisdictions simultaneously, and therefore with drastically reduced fees and administrative complications.

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Trademark ownership can provide innumerable benefits to your brand and business. Like any application to institutions and state bodies, however, the process of applying for a mark can seem fraught with procedural peculiarities and technical challenges. Below we outline the basic steps of the Trademark filing process and highlight the key concepts that underpin the determination of mark applications.

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Many individuals looking to do business in the US are not aware that the US allows nationals of over 130 countries in the world to live and do business in the US as “treaty traders”, under the E-1 visa category. This is because the US has entered into strategic navigation and commerce agreements with these countries which promote trade and business.

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In a time of potential global recession and high inflation, many people’s finances may not be in the best place at the moment. Unfortunately, in these situations, debt collectors are at their busiest trying to recover as much as they can from debtors, while minimizing losses for their clients.

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Canada recently made changes to its immigration system in the form of Bill C-19, which amends the country’s immigration act, among a variety of other laws. The bill will change how the government chooses candidates via its Express Entry system in particular.

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The intricacies of tax law can be overwhelming for almost anyone. We will discuss and outline some of the basics you need to know about your tax obligations under the law if you are a UK citizen living abroad.

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This week we take a look at international taxes for Canadians and US citizens living abroad! Learn more about how to navigate these tax filings if you are an expat in this week’s blog post!

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In a major new development, the UK government as created a new Visa program specifically for applicants who have graduated from top universities outside the UK within the last five years. Applicants under this new plan are eligible regardless of where they were born, and are not required to have an offer of employment in the UK to apply. Instead, in an attempt to attract what the government is calling the “best and brightest,” applicants who have obtained a bachelor's or master's degree will be granted a two-year work Visa, or a three-year Visa if they have earned a PhD.

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In this article, we will highlight the significance of implicit bias in immigration and visa adjudications, while outlining ways to mitigate or overcome such bias. Over the past two decades, there has been a great deal of research on implicit bias within the fields of social psychology, cognitive science, and neuroscience. Implicit bias is largely automatic and occurs below the level of conscious awareness. Legal scholars have examined the relevance of implicit bias to areas such as employment discrimination, legislative efforts, and legal decision making. Yet its relevance to immigration law remains largely unexplored.

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The United States of America is one of the only countries in the world which taxes its citizens on their worldwide income, regardless of whether they are residents of the United States or not. This can create quite detrimental consequences for US citizens working outside the US. With so many US business and government agencies operating abroad, in countries or regions like the United Kingdom, Japan, South Korea, the UAE (think Dubai or Abu Dhabi), Bahrain, the wider Middle East, the EU and elsewhere, there are millions of citizens abroad who have to file taxes and report their income. So how do these citizens avoid being taxed in both the US and their current country of residence? We explain this in our blog post.

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In 2018, Big Four accounting firm Ernst & Young (EY) was accused of legal and ethical violations in its audit work for a Dubai gold refiner in a subsequent court claim. The case was brought by Amjad Rihan, a former EY partner based in Dubai, who claimed he was “forced out” of the company after he identified alleged money laundering by Kaloti Jewellery International. Mr Rihan was the audit partner with overall responsibility for Kaloti in 2013. This case highlights the importance of thorough due diligence and the consequences of failing to engage in such processes.

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Today, English is the third most commonly spoken language in the world, and it has grown to become the primary language of business, academics, as well as the default language in most areas of research and professional publication. In light of this trend, it is crucial to recognize the importance of English proficiency as a part of the immigration process throughout the English-speaking world, particularly if you plan to work or study abroad.

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