This is often a question for faced by office-holders of insolvent companies when investigating a company’s affairs, and more of a concern for former directors and shareholders when potentially facing a claim for the return of unlawful dividends or misfeasance.
At first blush, it may seem counterintuitive for financiers to compete to provide loans to debtor companies that have just filed for protection under an insolvency or restructuring procedure, but they have been proven to do so on a large scale in US Chapter 11 cases and for a variety of reasons, whether to protect an existing loan position or taking an opportunity to garner significant, safe returns as a new lender.
In the recent case Re CW Advanced Technologies Limited, the Hong Kong court took the opportunity, albeit only obiter dicta, to raise and briefly comment on certain unresolved questions surrounding three issues of interest to insolvency practitioners:
A Guide to Doing BUSINESS IN HONG KONG Contents Introduction Hong Kong at a Glance 1 Political System 1 Legal System 1 Economic System 1 Investment Incentives 1 Financial System 1 International Relationships 1 Relationship with the PRC 2 Belt and Road Initiative 2 General Data Protection Regulation 2 Business Vehicles Types of Business Vehicle 5 Business Registration 5 Special Types of Business 5 Hong Kong Companies 5 Incorporation of a Private Limited Company 5 Branch Operations 7 Reasons for Choosing a Branch or Subsidiary 7 Representative Offices 8 Sole Proprietorships/General Partnershi
TV rental business, Box Clever, was created as a joint venture between Granada (now ITV) and Thorn (now Carmelite).
The Box Clever business was later sold and administrative receivers were subsequently appointed over Box Clever companies.
The Pensions Regulator (“TPR”) issued Financial Support Directives (“FSDs”) against five ITV companies in relation to the Box Clever defined benefit pension scheme. ITV referred the determinations to the Upper Tribunal.
In the wake of the Carillion insolvency and the Toys R Us administration, there are contrasting tales from two different UK businesses.
The engineering business Rolls-Royce is going against the trend and has announced that it will keep its defined benefits pension scheme open for current members until January 2024.
The scheme is running at a £1.4 billion surplus, which will also allow the company to decrease its contributions to its defined benefit retirement fund by £145 million over the next three years.
At the start of 2017, UK businesses had reported a 33% risk of insolvency, compared to the end of 2017 which saw that figure increase to nearly 40%.
These figures were calculated by drawing together key performance indicators including balance sheets and records of the directors’ successful (or unsuccessful) directorship history.
What happens if a debtor is made bankrupt after a creditor has issued debt recovery proceedings?
A bankruptcy debt is any debt that the bankrupt owed to the relevant creditor at the date of the bankruptcy order, or a debt which arises under an obligation incurred by the debtor before the bankruptcy order, but one which falls due after the date of the bankruptcy order (known as contingent debts).
It is not uncommon to see that the law governing a loan document is different from that of the debtor company’s place of incorporation. Can the rights of the lender be altered by a restructuring plan sanctioned in the latter? The English court said “no” in a recent case1, applying the longstanding Gibbs rule that also applies under Hong Kong law.
Background
The Insolvency Service has just released its personal insolvency statistics for 2017 revealing an upturn in overall personal insolvencies (just under 10% more than in 2016) and an increase of around 1/5th (19.8% on 2016) of people entering into Individual Insolvency Arrangements (IVAs). More people entered into IVAs last year than in 2008 (when many consider the credit crunch took its grip).