The costs of presenting a bankruptcy or winding up petition in the UK have increased from 16 November 2015, under the Insolvency Proceedings (Fees) (Amendment) Order 2015. The Official Receiver's deposit, which is paid to the Insolvency Service to cover a proportion of the OR's fees in the event a Bankruptcy Order or Winding Up Order is made, will rise for creditors' bankruptcy petitions from £750 to £825 and for compulsory winding up petitions from £1,250 to £1,350. The deposit will remain unchanged for debtor's own bankruptcy petitions.

Section 236 Insolvency Act ("IA") 1986 enables the Court power to summon persons with information about the affairs of a company to appear before it and / or to produce documents. In our August bulletin we considered the decision of the English High Court in Re MF Global [2015] EWHC 2319 when it was held that s236 does not have extra-territorial effect. However, having looked at the issue again in Official Receiver v Norriss [2015] EWHC 2697, the High Court has departed from the position in Re MF Global.

In a judgment given on 5 November 2015, the Final Appeal Court in Hong Kong held that s30A(10)(a) of the Bankruptcy Ordinance, which prevents the period of bankruptcy running from the date the Bankruptcy Order if the bankrupt is outside of Hong Kong, is unconstitutional. The Court found that the provision, which provides that upon returning to Hong Kong the Bankrupt must inform his Trustee and the period of bankruptcy runs from that date, is a disproportionate infringement on an individual's right to travel.

This article was first published by RECOVERY News and the full article can be found online here. 

In our June seminars we discussed the Pre-Pack Pool and the proposed changes to SIP 16. The revision was recommended by Teresa Graham as part of her independent review into pre-packs in June 2014, and the new SIP 16 was introduced on 2 November 2015 to coincide with the launch of the Pre-Pack Pool.

Key provisions of the revised SIP 16, which remains virtually unchanged from the draft issued in January this year, include:

The Supreme Court of the United States announced decisions in two cases today:

The Supreme Court of the United States announced decisions in three cases today:

The Supreme Court of the United States announced decisions in three cases today:

The Commission brought an offering fraud action against two long time residential real estate businessmen, Thomas S. Mulholland and James C. Mulholland, Jr. The two defendants had been in the residential real estate business since the 1990s. By 2008 they had raised about $16 million from investors. Thomas and James Mulholland had about 300 properties and apartment building units.

Pursuant to a June 27, 2012 tribal resolution, on July 2, 2012, the Santa Ysabel Resort and Casino filed a voluntary chapter 11 bankruptcy petition. The casino is an unincorporated enterprise for economic development owned by the Iipay Nation of Santa Ysabel, a federally recognized Indian tribe. After numerous construction problems during the peak of construction pricing, the casino opened in 2007, just before the drop in the economy.