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Category: English law

The case for digital assets legislation in Scotland

by David Fox, Professor of Common Law, University of Edinburgh

The England and Wales Law Commission has recently published its final report on Digital Assets (Digital assets – Law Commission).[1]  The report comes after an exhaustive study of the way that existing principles of private law in England and Wales would apply to this emerging class of assets.  It is of great significance since digital assets are fast becoming mainstream vehicles for carrying out financial transactions as conventional forms of financial securities are adapted to work on blockchain technology.  The report acknowledges that private law is as relevant to digital assets as the specialist regimes of financial services regulation that were the main focus of attention in the early days of their development.

The Law Commission report is relevant to Scotland which has an important fintech industry of its own but where the application of fundamental principles of Scots private law to digital assets remains obscure.  Any new clarification of the legal rules in Scotland would need to allow for the subtle similarities and differences between English and Scots property law and for the divergent patterns of legal development in each jurisdiction.

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Apparent authority: striking an appropriate balance?   

by Laura Macgregor, Professor of Scots Law, University of Edinburgh.

Introduction

Apparent authority is a key concept in agency law, acting to protect third parties negatively impacted by the activities of agents acting without authority. In relevant cases, the law seeks to strike a balance between the interests of the principal and those of the third party. London & Quadrant Housing Trust v Stokes, a decision by Mr Justice Martin Spencer, sitting in the English High Court, Queen’s Bench Division in March of this year ([2022] EWHC 1120 (QB)) is a case which nicely illustrates the difficulties of achieving such a balance.

Criteria for application of apparent authority

The third party must prove that the principal has made an erroneous representation of the agent’s authority, which representation has been relied on by the third party to his or her detriment (for more detailed analysis, see Laura J Macgregor, The Law of Agency in Scotland (2013) paras 11-01 – 11.26). The principal’s representation can be by words or conduct, and recent cases have extended the meaning of a representation significantly. Famously, in First Energy (UK) Ltd v Hungarian International Bank Ltd ([1993] 2 Lloyd’s Rep 194) an agent was considered authorised to communicate information on behalf of his principal, which information could include the extent of his own authority. This comes very close to recognising the idea of a self-authorising agent.

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