Over the past year or so, we have seen a number of examples of Dubai Courts taking an extremely cautious approach to handling debtor-led bankruptcy cases, particularly in relation to determining whether there is a legitimate distressed financial position and enquiring as to the conduct of managers leading to the bankruptcy of companies.

Different recession, regulatory environment and litigation market leads to different exposures

Whilst there is a clear link between recessionary conditions and claims against financial institutions, financial services professionals and directors and officers, the lessons from the previous recessions in the early 1990s and 2008 onwards may only take us so far in predicting the outcomes this time, given the different economic base going in and the catalysts for this recession (which include the pandemic, the war in Ukraine and high inflation).

In what has been referred to as a “momentous decision for company law”, the Supreme Court recently considered whether, when a company is in the ‘insolvency zone’, its directors must have regard to the interests of its creditors in addition to, or instead of, its shareholders.

Introductie

In het derde kwartaal van 2022 zijn op www.rechtspraak.nl uitspraken gepubliceerd waarin de ingestelde vordering gegrond was op bestuurdersaansprakelijkheid. Het betrof 1 uitspraak van de Hoge Raad (81 RO), 3 conclusies van de advocaat-generaal bij de Hoge Raad, 27 uitspraken van de gerechtshoven en 28 van rechtbanken.

In deze Kwartaalupdate Bestuurdersaansprakelijkheid voor Q3 2022 is een selectie gemaakt uit deze uitspraken. De navolgende onderwerpen komen aan bod:

In a judgment rendered on 10 October 2021, the Dubai Court of First Instance had concluded that current and former directors and managers of Marka were personally liable towards creditors of the company merely on the basis that the assets of the company were not sufficient to pay at least 20% of its debts. The 20% threshold was set in onshore Federal Decree Law No. (9) of 2016 on Bankruptcy (the Bankruptcy Law) as it then was, and the Court determined that liability applied to current and former directors and managers without distinction where the threshold is not met.

In June 2021, we published an article (here)about the positive implications for insurers of our win in an unreported County Court case[1] in which the Deputy District Judge held that an insured’s insolvency did not have the effect of “pausing” the limitation clock from that date in relati

In het tweede kwartaal van 2022 zijn op www.rechtspraak.nl 52 uitspraken gepubliceerd waarin de ingestelde vordering gegrond was op bestuurdersaansprakelijkheid. Het betrof 3 uitspraken van de Hoge Raad, 6 conclusies van de advocaat-generaal bij de Hoge Raad, 15 uitspraken van de gerechtshoven en 28 van rechtbanken.

In deze Kwartaalupdate Bestuurdersaansprakelijkheid voor Q2 2022 is een selectie

gemaakt uit deze uitspraken. De navolgende onderwerpen komen aan bod:

01. Bestuurdersaansprakelijkheid en matiging

(Hoge Raad 13 mei 2022) 2

In deze Kroniek wordt een selectie van de tussen mei 2021 en mei 2022 door de Hoge Raad gewezen arresten besproken. Daarbij komen onder meer uitspraken op het gebied van beroeps- en bestuurdersaansprakelijkheid, productaansprakelijkheid en werkgeversaansprakelijkheid aan de orde.

The challenges faced by the construction industry are continuing to grow and insiders wonder when the storm is going to hit. For some, like Probuild, it already has. Rising inflation and the increasing cost of debt, labour shortages, supply chain delays and escalating cost of freight and materials are putting the industry under enormous pressure. Simultaneously Governments have invested heavily in building and construction to maintain growth in the economy.

Supreme Court 22 January 2022, ECLI:NL:HR:2020:80 - www.rechtspraak.nl

Introduction

Recently, the Supreme Court dealt with the following question: can the bankruptcy trustee recover a payment made from a bank account with a debit balance in the name of the bankrupt company after the bankruptcy date, as undue payment due to a breach of the fixation principle or the equality of creditors principle?