10.5.2016

Official Journal of the European Union

C 165/11

(Case C-136/16)

(2016/C 165/13)

Language of the case: Portuguese

Referring court

Parties to the main proceedings

Appellant: Sociedade Metropolitana de Desenvolvimento SA

Respondent: Banco Santander Totta SA

Questions referred

1.In a dispute between two national undertakings of a Member State concerning agreements, does the fact that such agreements contain clauses conferring jurisdiction to another Member State constitute a sufficient international element to give rise to the application of Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 (1) and Regulation No 1215/2012 (2) to determine international jurisdiction, or must there be other international elements?

2.May application of the jurisdiction agreement be waived where the choice of the courts of a Member State other than that of the nationality of the parties causes serious inconvenience for one of those parties and the other party has no good reason to justify such choice? In the event that it is held that other international elements are necessary in addition to the jurisdiction agreement:

3.Do the swap agreements concluded between [Sociedade Metropolitana de Desenvolvimento, S.A.] (‘SMD’) and Banco Santander Totta have sufficient international elements to give rise to the application of Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 and Regulation (EU) No 1215/2012 in order to determine which courts have international jurisdiction to settle disputes relating to them where:

(a)Those entities are nationals of a Member State, Portugal, that concluded two swap agreements in Portugal consisting of an ISDA Master Agreement and two confirmations, negotiated by the Autonomous Region of Madeira on behalf of SMD;

(b)In that negotiation, the Autonomous Region of Madeira, assisted by Banco BPI, S.A., and by a law firm, invited more than one international bank to submit proposals, one of those invited banks being JP Morgan;

(c)Banco Santander Totta is wholly owned by Banco Santander, with domicile in Spain;

(d)Banco Santander Totta acted in its capacity as an international bank with subsidiaries in various Member States and under the single brand Santander;

(e)Banco Santander Totta was considered in the ISDA Master Agreement as a Multibranch Party, able to make and receive payments in any transaction through its subsidiaries in London or Luxemburg;

(f)Under the terms of the ISDA Master Agreement concluded, the parties may, in certain cases, transfer their rights and obligations to other representative offices or subsidiaries;

(g)The parties to the swap agreements specified that English law was applicable and concluded jurisdiction agreements that confer exclusive jurisdiction on the English courts;

(h)The agreements were drafted in English and the terminology and concepts used are Anglo-Saxon;

(i)The swap agreements were concluded with the objective of covering the risk of variation in the interest rates of two financing agreements, both drafted in English and concluded with foreign entities (one based in the Netherlands and the other in Italy), and in one of the financing agreements it is provided that borrowers’ payments must be made to the HSBC Bank Plc account in London, on dates defined by reference to the London time zone and subject to English law and the English courts;

(j)Banco Santander Totta acted as an intermediary of the international market, having concluded hedging agreements in the context of the international market?

Council Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 of 22 December 2000 on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters (OJ 2001 L 12, p. 1).

Regulation (EU) No 1215/2012 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 12 December 2012 on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters (OJ 2012 L 351, p. 1).