PartnerLondon
Joe Gosden is a partner in our London office with a broad commercial practice in the shipping, trade finance and commodities sectors.
An experienced lawyer with significant litigation, arbitration and advocacy experience, Joe acts for interests across the commodities, shipping and insurance worlds. He acts as a trusted advisor to traders, shipowners, insurers and Clubs alike.
Qualifying first as a solicitor and later as a barrister, Joe has full rights of audience in England & Wales. He advises clients on complex cross-border litigation, transactions and international arbitration. He has particular expertise in oil trading and trade finance matters in addition to classic shipping and commodities instructions relating to sale contracts, charterparties and bills of lading.
Adept at handling local interests and managing foreign proceedings, Joe has significant experience in running matters across multiple jurisdictions. Joe is often instructed as a trouble-shooter on transactions and is brought in to negotiate restructurings, distressed assets/loans and find solutions to disputed deliveries.
Joe frequently advises on and drafts lending structures, bespoke terms & conditions, sale contracts and letters of credit across the commodities, trade finance and shipping world.
Highlights of Joe’s work include the following:
Interested in specific aspects of Joe’s recent work? Contact [email protected] for further reference cases.
Professional Experience
Education
In this episode, Joe Gosden, ZFZ partner, joins Luke to discuss a fascinating topic in shipping law.
A bill of lading in the hands of a charterer is a mere receipt of goods. It is not yet a contract of carriage between bill holder and carrier. When that bill is endorsed, it becomes a contract of carriage in the hands of the non-charterer endorsee.
But what happens if the shipper/charterer holding the bill as a receipt novates away the charterparty. Is the bill operable in the hands of that shipper (and no longer the charterer)?
We study the status of the bill – is it only “suspended” when in the hands of the charterer, or does it “spring to life” on endorsement? A birth, so to speak.
There is also an interesting causation argument on whether the bank would have insisted upon presentation of original bills in any event. If not, then did the failure to present OBLs cause any loss?
Joe and Luke also discuss some of the complications for trade finance banks/companies in protecting their position with adequate security and a few war stories they’ve experienced along the way.
Event: Istanbul Arbitration Week
Attendees: Joe Gosden, Anastasiia Demidova
Date: 30 Sep – 4 Oct 2024
Venue: Istanbul, various
Istanbul Arbitration Week (ISTAW), hosted by the Energy Disputes Arbitration Center (EDAC), is a prestigious international arbitration event comprising a series of sessions focused on international investment, trade, and arbitration.
At ISTAW2024, they will be expanding horizons beyond investment and energy arbitration. This year, sessions will also cover arbitration in mining, agriculture, and various other sectors, ensuring a comprehensive exploration of arbitration’s broadest dimensions.
Learn More: https://istaw.com/
Every now and then a commodities trade goes horribly wrong, the parties fall out and someone rings their lawyer to ask: ‘can we stop the letter of credit?’. Injunctions to stop letters of credit are rare as hens teeth in England or the US but more common in other jurisdictions, where civil law systems allow greater latitude.
The Commercial Court’s decision in Macquarie Bank Limited v Banque Cantonale Vaudoise [2024] EWHC 114 (Comm) sets out in crystal clear terms the English law view on attempts to do so and the enduring liability of the issuing bank.
We had a remarkable time at our New York client event last week!
The war in Ukraine will have a significant impact on international commodities trade. We will focus on several likely scenarios commodity traders may face as a consequence of this war, including: Price fluctuations | Failure to make delivery | Failure to make payment.
Speakers: Joseph Gosden (London), Alfred Siwy (Vienna), Philip Vagin (London, New York)
Tuesday, 29 March 2022
08:30 GMT | 09:30 CET