On 12 March 2010, the FSA published the statement that it had provided to the court appointed examiner of Lehman Brothers Holding Inc, which is referred to in his wider report on the collapse of Lehman Brothers.
View FSA statement to the US bankruptcy court examiner on the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc, 12 March 2010
On 25 March 2010, HM Treasury published a consultation paper which proposes improvements to the protection and payment of benefits for policyholders of insurers in financial difficulty. In particular, the proposals address certain gaps in the regime for insurers in administration in contrast to the regime applied in liquidation.
The FSA has published a statement that provides an update on The Freedom SIPP Limited - In Liquidation.
PricewaterhouseCoopers, liquidators of the Freedom SIPP Limited has appointed an agent to wind up the Freedom SIPP Scheme.
View Update on The Freedom SIPP Limited - In Liquidation, 29 January 2010
In the case of In the matter of Construction Confederation and In the matter of the Insolvency Act 1986 [2009] EWHC 3551 (Ch), the trustees of the Construction Confederation Staff Pension Scheme have obtained an order for winding up of the sponsoring employer, an unincorporated association.
In May 2009, the Treasury published a discussion paper entitled Developing effective resolution arrangements for investment banks. In this discussion paper the Treasury set out its initial thinking on the steps necessary to improve the regime around the failure of investment firms.
The FSA has released a further update on Keydata Investment Services Limited. The update reads as follows:
"On 18 November 2009 the Luxembourg financial services regulator, the Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier (the CSSF) applied to the Luxembourg court for Eric Collard of KPMG ADVISORY s.a.r.l to be appointed as administrateur provisoire (provisional administrator) of Lifemark S.A. (Lifemark).
On 9 November, the PPF published proposals for the 2011/12 pension protection levy year which aim to improve the way the insolvency risk for sponsoring employers is assessed. The proposals reflect industry feedback and a review of methodology and insolvency probabilities carried out by Dun & Bradstreet (D&B).
The key changes include:
The insolvency of UK insurance companies is, fortunately, a fairly rare event. Even in the current difficult times - and despite speculation about the solvency of some insurers - we have yet to see a UK insurance company actually go into liquidation.
The British Bankers’ Association has released the following statement on bank restructuring:
On 14 October 2009 the Government announced a major change to the way in which company buy-backs of debt will be taxed. The change may be relevant to any corporate debt buy-back where debt is being purchased at less than face value, including the exercise of a post-enforcement call option in a securitisation.
The global financial crisis has resulted in many loans trading at below par value. This presents borrowers with an opportunity to purchase their own debt and, therefore, extinguish the debt at a reduced cost.