The Supreme Court has held that, where a company had been the victim of wrong-doing by its directors, the directors’ wrong-doing could not be attributed to the company to prevent it (or its liquidators) from bringing claims against the directors. 

Months of anticipation culminated in a successful result for the Liquidators of Bilta (UK) Limited (in liquidation) on 22 April 2015 in a pivotal fraud case, whereby the Supreme Court unanimously dismissed an appeal involving the ‘illegality defence’, in the case of Jetivia SA and another v Bilta (UK) Ltd (in liquidation) and others [2015] UKSC 23.

Protecting your business from your customer’s insolvency

In the second article in our series on risk and opportunity in the fashion retail sector, Rob Russell and Peter Manley assess one of the most prominent areas of risk for suppliers − the insolvency of a trade customer/ retailer.

Heads of Terms’ or ‘Memoranda of Agreement’ (“MoA”) are commonly agreed by parties as a precursor to entering into more substantial agreements.

MoA are often intended by the parties to be broad statement  of commercial intent to enter into a contract, rather than having contractual force themselves. Accordingly, MoA are often drafted with a more relaxed attitude towards their contents

However, no matter what the parties may have intended, a MoA can easily amount to a contract depending on its drafting, exposing the parties to unintended liabilities.

A recent Court of Appeal decision has confirmed that the usual contractual rules, including as to remoteness of damage, apply by analogy to the assessment of compensation under a cross-undertaking in damages in a freezing order. However, there is also room for exceptions, given that there is in fact no contract: Hone and others v Abbey Forwarding Ltd and another[2014] EWCA Civ 711.

Background

Key points

The court has jurisdiction to order the UK Registrar of Companies to replace previously filed administrators' proposals.

The Facts

The administrators of a company filed a statement of proposals with the Registrar but then sought to replace the proposals because they contained information that the company was obliged to keep confidential. The administrators argued that:

Key point

The UK Government has published its response to their July 2013 consultation on restoring transparency and trust in the UK corporate governance regime. There are a number of proposals to widen the scope of the director disqualification regime and make recovery of losses by creditors from responsible directors easier.

The response

Insolvent Defendants

Corporate Insolvency

Dissolution

1. Corporate bodies (limited companies or LLPs) have a separate legal identity that ceases to exist upon dissolution. Dissolution can occur, broadly speaking, in two ways, one is at the end of the process of winding up (whether voluntary or compulsory) and the other is by the process of striking off the Register of Companies 

or limited liability partnerships. The latter occurs either as a result of the company’s

Yesterday the UK Financial Conduct Authority (the “FCA”) published  the final text of some significant changes to the Listing Rules.1 The changes, which will come into force on 16 May 2014, are intended to enhance the effectiveness of the UK listing regime, particularly in situations where the rights of minority shareholders are at risk of being abused, and to address concerns in relation to the potential influence of 

controlling shareholders on UK listed companies, while ensuring that London remains an attractive listing 

venue.