Dealing with Regional Agreements: A Practical Approach

Sancho Guibert, Assistant General Counsel, Citibank

As with empires on which the sun never sets, big multi-national companies from diverse economic sectors which run different lines of businesses around the globe have to deal with many issues and challenges in order to on-board and serve properly millions of customers in different continents (or, in corporate jargon, clusters or regions). Big international companies covering global operations across a network of companies, subsidiaries and affiliates are cognizant that, alongside globalization, free trade, entrepreneurship and property rights, the rule of law is the overarching principle that bolsters growth and progress in today’s world commerce. In addition to a wide array of global, regional and local corporate policies and procedures which are needed and very frequently required by regulators to conduct business in a safe and sound manner in every geographical market, multi-national companies are always keen on structuring regional deals with a view to streamline local business initiatives and products under a common standard to ease their implementation, management and monitoring from a global or regional perspective. An interesting legal instrument to accomplish that purpose is the execution of regional or master agreements which set out common standards which are subsequently cascaded down to each country.