In the matter of Free Wesleyan Church of Tonga in Australia (inc (administrators appointed) Phoenix Lacquers & Paints Pty Limited v Free Wesleyan Church of Tonga in Australia Inc (administrators appointed) & Ors [2012] NSWSC 214 (13 March 2012), the plaintiff, Phoenix Lacquers, sought a declaration regarding the validity of a resolution to remove and replace joint and several administrators of the Free Wesleyan Church of Tonga which did not succeed.  The Free Wesleyan Church of Tonga in Australia was incorporated under the Associations Incorporation Act 2009 (NSW) and

In Simpson v Commission of Inland Revenue (2012) 25 NZTC 20-119 (CA) the Court of Appeal held that receivers of a mortgagee which is not registered for GST must still account to Inland Revenue for GST on a mortgagee sale. This decision is controversial and pending possible resolution of the matter by an appeal to the Supreme Court, receivers of mortgagees that are not registered for GST should take legal advice as to how they should best proceed.

Fairfield Sentry Limited (Sentry) was a "feeder fund" that placed 95% of its investments into BLMIS.  When BLMIS was discovered to be a Ponzi scheme, Sentry suspended redemptions of its shares and went into liquidation.  Here, Sentry's liquidators sought to have redemptions paid to the defendant investors prior to the suspension returned to Sentry's fund on the grounds that the redemptions were paid under a mistake because Sentry's net asset value (NAV) was "little better than nil" due to the Ponzi scheme.

The issues were:

We reported on the first instance decision in this litigation last year (see here).  The New South Wales Court of Appeal recently delivered judgment on the liquidators' appeal.

The Supreme Court of Victoria has recently given some guidance on when a secured creditor who is entitled to enforce a charge over "the whole, or substantially the whole of the company's property" can validly appoint a company administrator.

The English High Court in Telnic Ltd v Knipp Medien Und Kommunikation GmbH [2020] EWHC 2075 (Ch) has confirmed that the court has discretion to restrain a winding-up petition against debtor's when the debt is governed by an arbitration agreement.

Knipp Medien Und Kommunikation GmbH (Knipp) appealed against an order to stay its winding-up petition against Telnic Limited (Telnic). Telnic also brought a cross-appeal seeking orders that Knipp's petition be dismissed rather than stayed.

In Re A Company (injunction to restrain presentation of petition) [2020] EWHC 1406 (Ch), the Court held that it is able to take into account the likelihood of a change in the relevant law in deciding whether to restrain a winding up application from being brought.

Bloomberg reported last month that the Madoff bankruptcy has one more big case to go, chasing USD3.2b held by foreign banks (see our related story above). Mr Picard, the bankruptcy trustee, has reportedly recovered over USD14b of the USD17.5b in losses arising from Madoff's Ponzi scheme.

The Hobson Apartments suffer from water tightness issues.  Unusually for a unit development, the top floor apartment on level 12 owned by the appellant Manchester Securities, owned the exterior of its unit including the roof of the building rather than the Body Corporate.  Severe water damage was identified in October 2009.  Following a series of High Court decisions and one Court of Appeal decision, Manchester Securities was required to contribute certain amounts to the Body Corporate for repair costs.

The liquidators of Wenztro Co-operation Limited (Wenztro) appealed against the High Court's decision not to order Wenztro's former director, Mr Ellis, to produce and be examined on personal financial information including tax return and bank statements. The liquidators sought to assess Mr Ellis' judgment worthiness for the legal proceedings they had commenced against him for breaches of directors' duties.