Sova Capital Ltd (“Sova”) was an FCA authorised and regulated broker. Before it went into Special Administration, Sova provided investment brokerage services to institutional and corporate clients, mostly trading in the Russian market.
The war in Ukraine continues and the economic effect of sanctions against businesses that are connected to the Russian government are now being felt in earnest. Unsurprisingly, sanctions are becoming an increasingly hot topic for insolvency practitioners.
Recent months have seen the Courts hand down some important decisions, which provide helpful guidance on situations where the sanctions regime interfaces with insolvency processes. We have summarised three of the most significant in this article.
On 28 October 2022, the High Court handed down judgment in the case of Alma Property Management Ltd v Crompton And Another [2022] EWHC 2671 (Ch).
In this case, the (freeholder) Claimant sought an order for specific performance of the (leaseholder) Defendants' repairing obligations under a lease of the common parts of a block of flats called North Tower in Manchester.
The High Court of Hong Kong refused to allow a Chapter 11 Trustee to disclose a Decision from Hong Kong winding up proceedings in the US bankruptcy court. The US proceedings were commenced to prevent a creditor from taking action following a breach of undertakings given to the Hong Kong court in circumstances where the company had no jurisdictional connection with the US.
Following our previous article, the Court of Appeal dismissed an appeal following the High Court deciding that a moratorium in relation to restructuring proceedings in Azerbaijan could not be extended in breach of the Gibbs rule, allowing two significant creditors to proceed with their claims in the English Courts.
Despite the debtor's contention that his primary residence was in the United States, the Court held that it had jurisdiction to make a Bankruptcy Order following a petition presented by HMRC.
HMRC presented a bankruptcy petition against Robert Stayton on 30 May 2014 who owed approximately £653,640. The matter came before the court on a number of occasions before the final hearing, with judgment being handed down in November 2018.
A discharged Bankrupt had intentionally misled the Court as to his COMI being in England and Wales in order to obtain a Bankruptcy Order. Four years after the making of the Bankruptcy Order, the Court annulled it on the grounds that the Court did not have jurisdiction to make the Order in the first place.
Ashfords successfully acted for the Joint Trustees in Bankruptcy of Vincent Mascarenhas (deceased) in their application to discharge Freezing Orders, an Interim Charging Order and an Interim Third Party Debt Order obtained by creditors of the late Bankrupt in 2014. The Joint Trustees were not a party to the original proceedings but had standing to make the applications.
The Hong Kong Court have confirmed for the first time that a foreign voluntary liquidation is eligible for common law recognition and assistance in Hong Kong.
China Culture Media International Holdings Limited, incorporated in the BVI, was wound up on 9 May 2016. China Culture was the sole shareholder of Supreme Tycoon Limited, also incorporated in the BVI.
In an urgent application, the Court of Appeal held that a CVA should be precluded from becoming effective where an unanticipated claim of €126.7m was submitted after the CVA was approved but before the statutory bar on new claims had lapsed.