Edgeworth Capital Luxembourg Sarl (2) Aabar Block Sarl V Glenn Maud [2015] EWHC 3464 (Comm)
The High Court in England has ruled on whether Spanish Law has the effect of extinguishing third party guarantees when the beneficiary of the guaranteed liabilities enters into insolvency proceedings in Spain.
Section 236 Insolvency Act ("IA") 1986 enables the Court power to summon persons with information about the affairs of a company to appear before it and / or to produce documents. In our August bulletin we considered the decision of the English High Court in Re MF Global [2015] EWHC 2319 when it was held that s236 does not have extra-territorial effect. However, having looked at the issue again in Official Receiver v Norriss [2015] EWHC 2697, the High Court has departed from the position in Re MF Global.
The English High Court has for the first time directly addressed the question of the extra-territorial application of s233 of the Insolvency Act 1986. The Official Receiver as Liquidator of Sahaviriya Streel Industries UK Ltd sought an order to restore access to an IT system provided to the Company by its parent company in Thailand. In granting permission to the Official Receiver to serve the application out of the jurisdiction, the Court was persuaded by the reasoning in the recent cases of Jetivia and Re Paramount Airways which concerned other provisions of the Insolvency Act 1986.
For the benefit of our clients and friends investing in European distressed opportunities, our European Network is sharing some current developments.
Recent Developments
July 2018
2018 Summer review M&A legal and market developments
In this issue...
Contractual provisions.............................................................1 Company law...........................................................................4
Listed companies....................................................................7 Good faith................................................................................9
Authors: Philip Broke, Veronica Carson
On 27 April 2015, the English High Court sanctioned a scheme of arrangement (the “Scheme”) for the US$200 million 9.5% senior notes due 2015 (the “2015 Notes”) issued by DTEK Finance B.V. (the “Issuer”), a Dutch finance subsidiary of the Ukraine’s largest privately owned energy group (“DTEK”). The Scheme was approved by 91.1% of noteholders.
On 30 October 2014, the English High Court sanctioned the second scheme of arrangement for the APCOA group (the “Scheme”). APCOA has been one of the hottest names in the restructuring market in 2014. First, it broke new ground in relation to an “amend and extend” scheme in early 2014 when it established sufficient connection to England off the back of a change in governing law. Second, the Scheme was aggressively opposed and its sanction by the High Court was appealed to the Court of Appeal (although ultimately the appeal was withdrawn).
One of the recent hot topics in the European restructuring market has been whether the UK Courts would sanction a scheme of arrangement in relation to a foreign company, with no previous connection to the UK whatsoever, where the sole basis for establishing jurisdiction to undertake the scheme would be amending the governing law and jurisdiction clauses of the company’s principal finance documents to English law.
The first appeal ruling from the newly formed UK Supreme Court concerned the construction of a clause setting out the distribution of assets in a collapsed structured investment vehicle (“SIV”). For the creditors attempting to salvage the remains of the SIV, and onlookers in similar situations, the judicial process has been a rollercoaster ride which has left them reeling.
The Bottom Line: