Cancellation of debt a key element of most restructurings generally triggers taxable income. The German tax authorities had issued an administrative decree (the "Tax Restructuring Decree" - Sanierungserlass), however, declaring that, upon the satisfaction of certain requirements and conditioned on forfeiture of any loss carry forwards, the cancellation of debt income ("CODI") would not be taxed.

D & D Wines was a leading distributor of wines, which went into administration. One of its clients was an Australian wine producer called Angove. Two of Angove’s customers, who dealt through D & D, paid the company shortly after it had gone into administration and after Angove had terminated the agency agreement. Despite this, the Court of Appeal ruled that the money belonged to the company in administration for the benefit of all its creditors and was not held on trust for Angove.