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.

Summary

In the recent Court of Appeal decision Bacci v Green [2022] EWCA Civ 1393 the Court, upholding the decision of the High Court, held that a judgment debtor can be ordered to delegate authority to waive valuable tax protection and draw pension where doing so would enable creditors to extract what they were owed.

The Facts

In 2017, Matthew Green, son of established Mayfair art dealer Richard Green, committed fraud in obtaining loans from FundingSecure.

Overview

When enacting the Bankruptcy Code, Congress sought to strike a balance amid the confluence of different — and often competing — interests held by debtors, secured creditors and various unsecured creditor constituencies (including landlords) through a framework of statutory protections. This has – at times – led to litigation over differing statutory interpretations as well as circuit splits as courts attempt to reconcile underlying policy goals with the less-than-clear language in various of the Code’s provisions.

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 Supreme Court has been given its first opportunity to “address the existence, scope and engagement of an alleged duty of company directors to consider, or to act in accordance with, the interests of the company’s creditors when the company becomes insolvent, or when it approaches, or is at real risk of, insolvency”. The corporate restructuring and insolvency community has been waiting for this “momentous” judgment with anticipation for the last 17 months.

The facts of the case:

Overview

Overview

Recently, in Shady Bird Lending, LLC v. The Source Hotel, LLC (In re The Source Hotel, LLC), Case No. 8:21-cv-00824-FLA (C.D. Ca. June 8, 2022), the Central District of California District Court adopted the majority view that a non-income producing property could be a “single asset real estate,” or SARE, debtor. The district court held that a hotel, which was not yet producing income, met the definition of a SARE.

Background

Summary

On 21 March 2022, the High Court in Counsel General for Wales and others v Allen and others [2022] EWHC 647 (Ch) (Re Baglan Operations Ltd) modified the decision of the Official Receiver to allow the insolvent Baglan Operations Limited (in liquidation) (the 'Company') to continue trading for a period of time to prevent environmental harm to the locality.

Overview

In Highland Capital Mgmt. v. Dondero (In re Highland Capital Mgmt.), Case No. 21-03007-sgj (Bankr. N.D. Tex. 2021), the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Northern District of Texas held that a debtor could not be compelled to abide by an arbitration clause in an agreement that was rejected pursuant to Section 365 of the Bankruptcy Code.

Background

We examine what impact the Court of Justice of the European Union decisions in Hampshire v PPF and PSV v Bauer will have on PPF compensation post-Brexit