A note on In the matter of Restore Builders Limited En Désastre [2024] JRC 290.

The Royal Court of Jersey has recently held, for the first time, that the actions of a Jersey company director constituted wrongful trading and ordered that he be personally liable for the company's debts and disqualified as a director for ten years.

Introduction

Overview

In a very litigious and long-running saga concerning some land near Bicester, a recent judgment involved parties applying to remove the Administrators.

In summary:

Irish companies can now avail of various methods with which to merge, migrate or spin off all - or portions of - their businesses with other European Union (“EU”) limited liability companies. In our experience, these restructuring tools can be particularly useful for global post-acquisition integration, carve-out, spin-off or rationalisation projects. This has been made possible by an EU directive introduced into Irish law on 24 May 2023 by the European Union (Cross-Border Conversions, Mergers and Divisions) Regulations 2023 (the “Regulations”).

key takeaways

Published on 21 January 2025, In the matter of Restore Builders Limited [2024] JRC290 (“Restore Builders”), is the first time the Royal Court of Jersey (“Court”) has made a wrongful trading order.

As discussed below, the Court held that Thomas McLaughlin (“Respondent”) be disqualified as a company director for 10 years, and be personally responsible for the debts of Restore Builders Limited (“Company”).

The Federal Court of Australia has recently delivered judgment in the case of Deputy Commissioner of Taxation v ACN 152 259 839 Pty Ltd [2024] FCA 1489. The Court held that in some circumstances, a statutory demand can be validly served on a perceived temporarily empty company office.

On 20 May 2024, an ATO officer purported to serve ACN 152 259 839 Pty Ltd (the Company) with a statutory demand and an accompanying affidavit by leaving the documents at the Company’s registered office.

Contract Natural Gas Limited v ZOG Energy Ltd [1] is the first post-Enterprise Act 2002 judgment on the effect of administration on limitation. After reviewing existing authority and statute, the Court confirmed that (among other things) time does not stop running for limitation purposes when a company enters a post-Enterprise Act administration. Fraser Ritson, Aziz Abdul and Brian Rostron acted for Joshua Dwyer and William Wright in their capacity as the joint liquidators of Contract Natural Gas Limited – in Liquidation.

Am 1. Januar 2025 ist das Bundesgesetz über die Bekämpfung des missbräuchlichen Konkurses in Kraft getreten. Das Bundesgesetz hat auch zu Anpassungen verschiedener Gesetze, darunter des Obligationenrechts und der Handelsregisterverordnung geführt. Nachstehend werden die wichtigsten Änderungen des Obligationenrechts und der Handelsregisterverordnung zusammengefasst. 

Änderungen beim Opting-Out

New rules in the UK allow Companies House to share non-public information with insolvency officeholders and the Official Receiver.

While in many cases there may be limited non-public information available from Companies House that will be useful to insolvency officeholders, this is another tool available to deploy in appropriate cases. It is specifically envisaged to assist officeholders pursuing claims for fraudulent and wrongful trading, transactions at an undervalue and preferences.

Introduction

Dissolution of a company can take place in several ways in the Netherlands. One of these options is turboliquidation, a procedure described in Article 2:19 paragraph 4 of the Dutch Civil Code (BW). The essence of this is that at the time of the dissolution decision, there must no longer be any assets present in the company.