Research On Regulation Of Treaty Shopping In International Investment Arbitration

In recent years,large amounts of international investment treaties set higher standards on protection and treatment for foreign investors.There is no organization and coordination mechanism like WTO in the field of international investment,so the fragmentation of international investment law becomes more apparent.By restructuring the investment and changing the nationality,foreign investors can gain access to benefits of an investment agreement concluded between the host state and a third state which is not the nation of the investor,and usually they get access to arbitration according to the agreement,this practice is known as �treaty shopping�.The first section is an overview of treaty shopping in the field of international investment arbitration.This section first explains the origin of the concept of treaty shopping.It comes from international tax agreements.Treaty shopping in the field of international investment means the practice of investors to gain access to investment treaties and arbitration trough shell companies in a third state.Then the methods of treaty shopping and the causes of this phenomenon is discussed in this chapter.The second section mainly talks about the legitimacy of treaty shopping and the necessity to regulate it.Actually,there is some divergence of view about the legitimacy of treaty shopping.But no doubt that the practice of treaty shopping do not conform to the purpose of the agreements.It is not only harmful to the public interests of the host country,but also have negative impacts on the development of investment environment.It's necessary to regulate treaty shopping in the field of international investment arbitration.The third part mainly analyses how the arbitration tribunal identify the legitimacy of treaty shopping and how to impose restrictions.The tribunal's approach to annlyse the behavior of investors has changed a lot compared to previous years.It focuses more on the purpose of the corporate structuring and restructuring than the definition of investment and the rules about the nationalities of the legal entities in the relevant agreements.To determine the legitimacy,the tribunal need to check the rules of corporate nationality?the time of treaty shopping and the purpose of investor's behavior.Then this section discuss the the path of reform for the international investment arbitration system to regulate treaty shopping more effectively.The fourth part mainly discuss the regulation of treaty shopping by the international investment agreements.It mainly depends on the limitation of definition of investment?adjustment of the dispute settlement clause and denial of benefits clause.At the same time,this section talks about the imperfection of these clauses and how to improve it.Finally,It's a good choice to introduce the experiences of international tax agreements to anti treaty shopping.The limitation on benefits article and main purpose test can be introduced to the field of international investment treaties.The last chapter is about China's methods to prevent treaty shopping.Though China haven't got involved in the dispute relevant to the practice of treaty shopping.But we are facing a high risk in the future.This part focuses on the perfection of the definition of investment,investor-state dispute settlement clause and denial of benefit clause in Chinese BITs.At the same time,It's also necessary to refresh the BITs between our country and conduit coutries like Netherlands.