Category: Supreme Court Case Summary Initiative

No-oral modification clauses seek to invalidate contractual modifications which are not made in writing. In Charles Lim Teng Siang and another v Hong Choon Hau and another, the Court of Appeal held that the no-oral modification clause in question did not apply to a rescission of the contract. It explored the legal effect of no-oral modification clauses in obiter, noting that such clauses likely raise a rebuttable presumption that in the absence of an agreement in writing, there would be no variation of the contract.

The winding up of a company spells its death. It is the process of collecting and selling off the company's assets in order to pay off creditors, after which any remaining assets will be distributed to its shareholders. The company is then dissolved and no longer exists. In Sun Electric Power Pte Ltd v RCA Asia Pte Ltd, the Court of Appeal introduces new legal principles; firstly, with respect to the conduct of a company's appeal against a winding-up order, and secondly, with regards to the test to be used in determining whether a company is unable to pay its debts.

In Takaaki Masui v Public Prosecutor and another appeal and other matters [2021] 4 SLR 160, the High Court introduced a new sentencing framework for purely private corruption offences under ss 6(a) and 6(b) of the Prevention of Corruption Act. Significantly, the HC utilised mathematical concepts to evaluate and determine the content of sentencing frameworks, and also employed multiple two-dimensional and three-dimensional graphs to represent various sentencing frameworks.

Cross-border contracts often raise questions as to which country’s law should govern the contract. A three-stage test is usually used to determine the governing law. The first two stages determine, respectively, whether parties had expressly or impliedly chosen a governing law, and the third stage determines the governing law based on the law with the closest connection to the contract (if no express or implied choice had been made). However, this test assumes that a contract exists in the first place. If the very existence of a contract is disputed and each contracting party argues that a different law governs the issue of contract formation, does the three-stage test apply or is a different approach required?

In Denka Advantech Pte Ltd v Seraya Energy Pte Ltd [2021] 1 SLR 631, the Court of Appeal affirmed the old rule on contractual penalties as articulated by Lord Dunedin in Dunlop Pneumatic Tyre Company, Ltd v New Garage and Motor Company, Limited [1915] AC 79: a liquidated damages clause is only enforceable if it is compensatory in nature, meaning that it provides a “genuine pre-estimate” of the likely loss caused by the breach.