Mr Marcus Collins This is Me

Education

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1. 1. ibap-phuket.org

   ibap-phuket.org/IBAP-programs? - [Cached]

   Published on: 7/7/2008   Last Visited: 7/7/2008

   Speaker: Marcus Collins of McEvily & Collins
   
   Marcus moved to Thailand 17 years ago and has worked and lived in Thailand since.He was born and raised in the Netherlands but holds a British passport.He has law degrees from Erasmus University in Rotterdam, the Netherlands and Cornell Law School, Ithaca, New York.He is admitted in New York and the Netherlands.He started his career working for Skadden, Arps, Meagher and Flom in New York City in the heydays of corporate raiders and was involved in a number of high profile mergers and acquisitions in those days.He moved back to Amsterdam to do his "articles" at Clifford Chance and after a return to New York 4 years later he rejoined Skadden, Arps and moved to Jakarta on secondment to a local firm.He never left South East Asia and his career took him from a partnership position at ILCT in Bangkok and to a partnership at Allen & Overy.During the financial crisis in Thailand he represented the banks in the debt restructurings of 2 of Thailand's top 10 listed companies.He joined Matthew McEvily 6 years ago together with Orawan Tejapaibul with whom he has worked at ILCT and Allen & Overy all those years.Marcus is a well known corporate and property lawyer and represents developers, investors and buyers alike, especially in Phuket and Phang Nga.

2. 2. www.bangkokpost.com

   www.bangkokpost.com/Business/0 - [Cached]

   Published on: 6/5/2008   Last Visited: 6/5/2008

   Collins: Laws were written decades ago
   
   While widely criticised proposals to toughen the Foreign Business Act (FBA) died with the end of the military-installed government last year, the current government still has its work cut out to modernise investment regulations, says Marcus Collins, a partner with the Bangkok law firm McEvily & Collins.
   
   The existing FBA is still based on concepts that date back to the era of military dictatorship three decades ago, and Thailand is a very different place, he said.
   
   "This economy has progressed so rapidly in the last two decades and we all know that the legal system here, the current laws, haven't really kept pace with the development and are still based on an economy that existed 20 years ago in large part," Mr Collins said in an interview.
   
   "I think it is really necessary for the government to take a critical look at the entire body of law applying to commercial transactions and see what needs to be done."
   
   He cited the Revenue Code as an outdated law that basically doesn't address issues that are relevant today.
   
   The Alien Business Law, the predecessor of the FBA, was introduced in 1972 by the National Executive Council, as the military government of the day was known.
   ...
   Mr Collins said the restrictions are bad for consumers because protection provides little incentive for some industries to be competitive.
   
   He has no quarrel with restrictions based on national security, religious and cultural reasons, but questions other barriers.
   
   "But even secdhtors such as agriculture, why not allow foreign companies to operate farms, why not allow foreign companies to bring in technology?Doing so is only going to benefit the economy, it isn't going to hurt it."
   
   Regulatory concerns aside, Mr Collins said foreigners were still favourably disposed toward Thailand now that it has returned to having an elected government.
   
   While his law firm has not seen a dramatic increase in investment, it does feel that people who were holding off when the military was in place are now coming back.The abolition of the Bank of Thailand's capital controls, which made it difficult to bring money in for investment purposes, has helped sentiment.
   
   Where property is concerned, he said, most foreign individual buyers are opting for leaseholds.Although Thai law allows foreigners to own up to 49% of a condominium building, Mr Collins said a lot of foreigners do not like living in a condominium building and prefer leasing landed property.
   ...
   "I don't think the government will allow foreigners to own land as such," said Mr Collins."I think that is such a hot potato ... but there is a lot that can be done to make it more attractive for foreigners to own property here or to make it easier legally for foreigners to have some right in property, for example by having longer lease terms or by allowing for a larger piece of a condominium building.
   
   "Thirty years as a leasehold is considered not very long term and of course there is great concern that a company that is a lessor might go bankrupt, so it might not even be able to extend a lease after 30 years."
   
   Mr Collins said there was a way to give indirect control over a land-owning company to a lessee, improving assurdhances that after 30 years the lease can be extended.

3. 3. RealEstateJournal | Second Homes

   www.realestatejournal.com/buys - [Cached]

   Published on: 6/7/2005   Last Visited: 6/12/2005

   It's a common arrangement and probably the most popular for its relative straightforwardness, says Marcus Collins, a lawyer with McEvily & Collins law firm in Bangkok.
   
   But many homeowners who buy on the higher end -- more than $250,000 -- want more than a lease, says Mr. Collins, under the logic of: "'If I pay that kind of money, I want to make sure I can own it freehold.'" Freehold ownership requires setting up a Thai company in whose name the property is registered.