Today the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy announced that certain temporary measures put in place under the Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020 (“CIGA”), which came into force on 26 June, will be extended.

The Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020 (Coronavirus) (Extension of the Relevant Period) Regulations 2020 were laid before the UK Parliament today and will come into force on 29 September 2020. Pursuant to these regulations, statutory demands and winding-up petitions will continue to be restricted until 31 December 2020.

The Court of Appeal in London today gave judgment on Parts A and B of the Lehman Waterfall II Appeal, as part of the ongoing dispute as to the distribution of the estimated £8 billion surplus of assets in the main Lehman operating company in Europe, Lehman Brothers International (Europe) (LBIE).

The Finance Act 2020 provides that directors, managers, shareholders, lenders and others can be made jointly and severally liable for the outstanding tax debts of insolvent (or potentially insolvent) companies and limited liability partnerships (LLPs).

The Supreme Court in London today gave judgment in the Waterfall I appeal, a dispute as to the distribution of the estimated £8 billion surplus of assets in the main Lehman operating company in Europe, Lehman Brothers International (Europe) (LBIE).

LBIE entered administration on 15 September 2008 and has now paid its unsecured creditors dividends of 100p in the £. The Waterfall I Supreme Court appeal addressed some of the key issues as to who should receive the surplus, which we discuss below.

“So-called” Currency Conversion Claims

The High Court in London gave judgment on Friday, 3 July 2020 on the relative ranking of over $10 billion of subordinated liabilities in the administrations of two entities in the Lehman Brothers group.

Major legislative changes

Reform of English corporate insolvency framework

The Insolvency Service is reviewing responses to its consultation on significant reforms designed to improve the restructuring tools available to companies. These include:

The new UK legislation for companies in financial difficulty represents a fundamental shift in approach to restructuring in Europe and adds an important new tool to the UK restructuring framework. The availability of a plan proposed under the new Part 26A of the Companies Act 2006 (a “Restructuring Plan”) will undoubtedly change how many distressed companies seek to address their financial difficulties. However, until case law is developed, there will remain considerable uncertainty as to how the Restructuring Plan will work in practice.

The High Court in London handed down judgment on Part C of the Lehman Waterfall II Application on 5 October 2016.

The judgment examines the extent of creditors’ entitlements to Default Rate interest on debts arising under ISDA Master Agreements governed by English law and New York law. As some £4.4 billion of LBIE’s admitted claims arise under ISDA Master Agreements and the debts were outstanding for more than five years, this judgment will materially influence the amount of money which must be applied in satisfaction of creditors’ entitlements to statutory interest.

In May 2009, the Treasury published a discussion paper entitled Developing effective resolution arrangements for investment banks. In this discussion paper the Treasury set out its initial thinking on the steps necessary to improve the regime around the failure of investment firms.

Again, of interest to all schemes providing defined benefits is the recent settlement in the litigation involving the Lehman Brothers Scheme, where the payment of £184 million, representing costs of the buying-out benefits, has been agreed.

Following a detailed investigation by TPR commencing in 2008, and a legal battle through the hierarchy of courts up to the Supreme Court (SC), members of the Lehman Brothers Pension Scheme will receive their full benefits after a settlement was reached on 18 August 2014.