TAIWAN Law and Practice Contributed by: Yafen Lin, Peng-Kwang Chen, I-Ming Chen and Weiyu Chiang, Formosa Transnational
Formosa Transnational Attorneys at Law 13F Lotus Building No 136 Sec 3 Jen Ai Rd Taipei City 106465 Taiwan
Tel: +886 2 2755 7366 Fax: +886 2 2755 6486 Email: ftlaw@taiwanlaw.com Web: www.taiwanlaw.com
1. Identifying Assets in the Jurisdiction 1.1 Options to Identify Another Party’s Asset Position In Taiwan, a judgment creditor must take sole respon - sibility for initiating civil enforcement by commenc - ing compulsory enforcement procedures. There is no governmental authority accountable for initiating such proceedings. Creditors have various options availa - ble to identify a debtor’s assets both before and after adjudication. Pre-adjudication Phase Registered assets Registered assets in Taiwan include real property, pat - ents, vehicles, and trademarks. The owners of these assets can be identified as follows. Real property Title to land and buildings is recorded by the Depart - ment of Land Administration in each Taiwanese city or county (collectively, the “Land Register Authority”). Title record information includes the name, ID number, and address of the owner. Although the Land Register Authority allows members of the public to obtain a transcript of registered infor - mation for a specific property (referred to as a “Type 2 transcript”), the Authority partially redacts the owner’s name, ID number, and address if the owner is a natural person. Consequently, it can be challenging to identify the full scope of the real property owned by a natural person debtor from Type 2 transcripts alone.
Furthermore, obtaining a Type 2 transcript requires the creditor to provide a specific land or building number to the Land Register Authority. This requirement effec - tively prevents a broad search for all real properties owned by the debtor using their name alone. It is thus impractical to conduct a fishing expedition to discover all of the debtor’s real properties. Nonetheless, a creditor can obtain more useful infor - mation about a debtor’s real property by petitioning for a court order as discussed in the paragraphs below concerning property disclosure orders to third parties. Patents Patent information is publicly available. A creditor may search for all registered patents owned by a debtor by using the Taiwan patent search system maintained by the Taiwan Intellectual Property Office. Trade marks Trade mark information is publicly available. A creditor may search for all registered trademarks owned by a debtor by using the trade mark search system main - tained by the Intellectual Property Office. Provisional attachment order A creditor with a monetary claim or a claim “exchange - able” for a monetary claim may seek a provisional attachment order against a debtor to prevent a debtor from transferring his/her assets. Examples of mon - etary claims are claims for payment of a negotia - ble instrument, repayment of loan, or rent. A claim exchangeable for a monetary claim means a claim
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