Two directors from the UK were disqualified for 12 years each after they used funds from existing clients to payback previous clients. The directors' company entered into loan agreements with existing clients worth around £9.1 million for forex trades, in return for interest and loan repayments. The Insolvency Service later discovered that at least £8.4 million was used to make interest and loan repayments to previous clients.

On 26 June 2020 the Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020 (the Act) came into force, introducing a number of temporary measures to assist companies facing financial difficulties as a consequence of COVID-19. These temporary provisions apply retroactively to cover the period commencing 1 March 2020 (26 March 2020 with respect to corporate governance provisions) and ending on 30 September 2020 (the Relevant Period).

On 25 June 2020, the Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020 (the Act) received Royal Assent, and the majority of its provisions are now in force. The Act has introduced a number of permanent reforms and temporary measures, which together represent the most significant change to English insolvency law in nearly 20 years.

Permanent Reforms

The permanent reforms include:

On June 26, 2017, the recast EU regulation on insolvency proceedings1 (the Recast Insolvency Regulation) came into force.

Existing Legislation

The SFO has announced that managing director and shareholder of Alta Gas Plc, Peter Brian Bradley, has been ordered to pay £1 million compensation to victims following confiscation proceedings on 26 January 2010. In 2001, Alta Gas Plc went into administrative receivership which resulted in the receivers of the company discovering a sophisticated system of false accounts that enhanced the profitability of the company.