Kuwait: Contracts and Commercial Law

Kuwait's Decree-Law No. 67 of 2026 fundamentally restructures Kuwait Petroleum Corporation, shifting it from a heavily regulated public entity to a commercially managed enterprise with board-led governance and streamlined contracting powers. The amendments remove prior-oversight constraints, prohibit local agency intermediation, and position KPC as a quasi-holding company with expanded authority over subsidiaries, financing, and procurement. What do these reforms mean for international counterparties, lende

The Ministry of Commerce and Industry bases its regulation of electronic delivery platforms and applications on its regulatory authority to safeguard economic public order, particularly by regulating services and preventing practices that distort competition or impose unbalanced contractual terms on commercial establishments.

Two bodies of law govern exclusivity in Kuwaiti distribution and agency arrangements, creating a complex interplay between contractual freedom and competition regulation. While the Commercial Agency Law abolished mandatory exclusivity to promote market access, the Competition Law places significant limits on how parties may structure their relationships, prohibiting arrangements that restrict competition. Understanding this tension—and how termination protections may inadvertently create anti-competit

For many years, whether disputes based on distribution agreements may be submitted to arbitration was an unsettled matter in Kuwait.