This briefing first appeared in the June 2020 edition of South Square Digest.

Executive Summary

In February 2020 the British Virgin Islands Commercial Court (the "BVI Court") sanctioned a creditor scheme of arrangement, which was part of a much larger cross boarder restructuring. This scheme of arrangement, which as a creditor scheme was itself rare for the BVI, was preceded by the BVI's first ever "soft touch" provisional liquidation (in linked proceedings), which commenced in December 2018.

On 9 October 2009, a three-judge panel of the Supreme Court issued a judgment (file no. IV CSK 145/09), in which it ruled that the Polish legal system provides for the possibility to secure claims under a parallel debt (created under foreign law).

Facts of the case

In November 2008, the European Commission (EC) found state aid granted by the Polish government to two Polish state-controlled shipyards (Stocznia Szczecinska Nowa and Stocznia Gdynia), illegal under EU single market rules and requested its return to the government with accrued interest. The EC decided however to postpone the enforcement of the return of state aid for seven months until 6 June 2009 to allow for the prior public sale of the shipyards’ assets at market price.