Facts
The company (‘Goldtrail’) was a tour operator. The director, who owned 100% of the company, had attempted to sell 50% of his shares to each of two companies without one knowing about the other. Goldtrail went into liquidation leaving passengers stranded overseas and owing £20m for repatriation.
Facts
The husband and wife were directors and shareholders of a company (‘C’). The husband was adjudged bankrupt in June 2014; the petitioners were appointed as his trustees in bankruptcy. Among the assets vested in the trustees under s 306 of the Insolvency Act 1986 (IA 1986), was the husband’s shareholding in C. However, the trustees were not registered as members of C until March 2015.
There have been a number of recent instances, including this year, of quoted companies calling general meetings to seek shareholder approval to remedy dividends that were paid unlawfully. Invariably these have been for non-compliance with a statutory formality rather than because the company did not have sufficient distributable profits to make the dividend.
Why are companies prepared to suffer the embarrassment and expense of going to their shareholders to fix the breach rather than simply doing nothing?
Due to the introduction of new tax legislation on 6th April 2016, distributions made to shareholders of companies undergoing Members’ Voluntary Liquidation (MVL) are now treated as income (rather than capital) and are taxed accordingly.
Finance Bill 2016 includes provisions designed to prevent taxpayers converting profits generated in a company into a capital receipt in the hands of the shareholder(s). Taxpayers may want to consider winding-up their companies or making substantial dividend distributions ahead of 6 April 2016 as a result of these measures and the changes to the taxation of dividends.
Broadly, the intention is that a capital distribution made in the winding-up of a company will be taxed as income if:
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.
Key Points
Where a sole director and shareholder of a company had breached fiduciary duties he could not ratify the breach if the company was insolvent;
Claims against the company in liquidation by dishonest assisting parties could not be set off under rule 4.90 Insolvency Rules against any liability they had in damages for that assistance.
The Facts
The courts have been busy in recent months considering various schemes of arrangement and reconstructions, including the following 4 unusual and high-profile applications.
In the matter of Co-operative Bank plc
18 December 2013
Companies Court (David Richards J)
[2014] EWHC 4397 (Ch)
21 November 2013
[2013] EWHC 3612 (Comm)
Commercial Court, Queen's Bench Division (Hamblen J)
Appointment of a receiver to bring protective claims against shareholder and former directors of a company by a potential creditor under an indemnity