Irish Times - Special Report / Articles On M&A

The Irish Government has published the Regulation of Artificial Intelligence Bill 2026, establishing a comprehensive framework for supervising and enforcing the EU AI Act in Ireland. This legislation creates the AI Office of Ireland as an independent statutory body to coordinate AI regulation, introduces a distributed oversight model involving multiple sectoral authorities, and provides detailed procedures for adjudication and administrative sanctions. The Bill addresses critical questions about how Ireland

Ireland has introduced significant amendments to its beneficial ownership registers in 2026, implementing the Sixth Anti-Money Laundering Directive (AMLD6) framework. These reforms fundamentally restructure access rights to the Central Register of Beneficial Ownership of Trusts and Corporate Entities, moving away from unrestricted public access toward a tiered system that balances transparency with privacy rights while maintaining accessibility for legitimate anti-money laundering purposes.

The Omnibus 1 Directive (EU) 2026/470 (Omnibus 1 Directive) was published in the Official Journal on 26 February. This new Directive, which amends the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD)...

The European Union has published revised sustainability reporting standards and introduced a voluntary framework that fundamentally changes how companies approach CSRD compliance. These reforms reduce reporting complexity through fewer datapoints and introduce value chain caps that limit information requests from smaller businesses. Understanding these changes is critical for both mandatory reporters and voluntary participants as implementation deadlines approach in 2026 and 2027.

Our corporate team were happy to advise AMCS on their latest acquisition as the business continues to grow their international footprint and scale.

This legislative update examines Ireland's Autumn 2026 legislative agenda, including reforms to director address disclosure and cooperative societies law, while analyzing key governance trends from the UK proxy season and the European Commission's corporate law harmonization priorities. The analysis explores shareholder activism, board diversity expectations, and the EU's ambitious "EU Inc." framework aimed at creating unified company law across Member States.

The Northern Ireland Assembly is advancing the Charities (Amendment) Bill, which introduces significant regulatory changes for charities operating in the jurisdiction. The legislation grants the Charity Commission for Northern Ireland expanded enforcement powers, overhauls accounting and reporting frameworks based on charity size, and clarifies the status of cross-border charitable organizations.

The Dublin office of leading international law firm, Maples and Calder, recently advised Cantor Fitzgerald on its agreement to acquire Merrion Capital Group.

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After months of intense negotiations, the European Parliament (the “Parliament”) and the Council of the European Union (the “Council”) have agreed new laws that substantially revise and simplify the EU’s corporate sustainability rulebook. Final approval of the package has been obtained and the amended “omnibus” directive (Directive (EU) 2026/470) was published in the Official Journal of the European Union on 26 February 2026.

On 24 July 2026, China's Ministry of Finance and State Taxation Administration jointly issued the Announcement on Individual Income Tax Matters Relating to Offshore Trusts (《财政部 税务总局关于离岸信托个人所 得税有关事项的公告》) (Announcement No. 21 of 2026) (the "Notice"), together with a companion Announcement of the State Taxation Administration on Collection and Administration Matters Relating to Individual Income Tax on Offshore Trusts...

CIMA’s new AML / CFT / CPF Compliance Rule and Sanctions Rule, effective 18 September 2026, introduce binding compliance, governance, risk management and sanctions screening requirements for all regulated financial service providers in the Cayman Islands.

An overview of the Cayman Islands fund finance market, highlighting H1 2026 trends, data and outlook, including transaction activity, subscription line and NAV facility developments, financing terms, pricing trends and market expectations for the second half of 2026.

The Cyber Resilience Act (Regulation (EU) 2024/2847)1 (“CRA”) establishes horizontal cybersecurity requirements for products with digital elements (“PDEs”) placed on the European Union (“EU”) market. Reporting obligations took effect on 11 September 2026, with full application of the CRA from 11 December 2027.

Most often, businesses gravitate towards the LTD model due to its familiarity and simplicity. However, DACs and Irish Collective Asset Management Vehicles...

Two years on from the entry into force of Directive (EU) 2024/927, commonly referred to as AIFMD II, the 16 April 2026 transposition deadline has passed, and the state of play across the EU is best described as uneven, with compliance posture increasingly dependent on where an AIFM is authorised. However, Luxembourg, which hosts the largest shares of EU AIFs within the Union, transposed the Directive without material gold-plating.

An overview of the European fund finance market, highlighting H1 2026 trends, data and outlook, including transaction volumes, jurisdictional preferences and emerging financing trends. This forms part of the August 2026 Edition of FUNDed

The BVI’s April 2026 update to its CRS Guidance Notes advances the implementation of CRS 2.0, expanding the scope of reportable accounts and introducing new compliance and reporting obligations ahead of the first reporting deadline on 31 May 2027.

The Republic of Marshall Islands (often referred to as the "Marshall Islands") is a self-governed independent state with its own constitution, located just north of the Equator in the Pacific Ocean.

The Irish Budget for 2027 (“Budget 2027”) was announced by Minister Simon Harris on 6 October 2026. Budget 2027 contains a number of measures intended to support Ireland’s status as a leading financial and investment jurisdiction in Europe. International investors will welcome the introduction of reforms for the taxation of Irish corporates, the introduction of new rules to accommodate the Pillar Two side-by-side agreement with the US and the extensions to Irish tax provisions for tax credits.