The Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Taurus Petroleum Ltd (Appellant) v State Oil Marketing Company of the Ministry of Oil, Republic of Iraq (Respondent) [2017] clarifies where a debt is situated under a letter of credit (“LoC”).… Continue Reading
Further to our recent blog posts regarding the long running litigation, last week the Supreme Court ordered that permission to appeal be granted to the Claimants in MasterCard Incorporated and others (Respondents) v Deutsche Bahn AG and others (Appellants) – UKSC 2017/0095. The appeal concerns prospective amendments to the Claimants’ case in the litigation which would introduce new claims … Continue Reading
On 6 October 2017, the Court of Appeal ruled that an investor with an interest in promissory notes cannot sue the issuing bank for allegedly making misleading statements about those promissory notes. There was no contractual relationship; only the bearer of the promissory notes could sue the issuer for breach of contract.… Continue Reading
Background As mentioned in our blog posted on 20 September 2016, MasterCard was facing one of the UK’s first class-action lawsuits, following the introduction of collective proceedings under the Consumer Rights Act 2015. This allows for collective proceedings to be brought in the Competition Appeal Tribunal (“CAT”) on an opt-out basis, by representatives of consumers … Continue Reading
As discussed in a previous blog (3 May 2017), consumers seeking compensation in relation to any new payment protection insurance (“PPI“) complaint will now have until 29 August 2019 to complain to the Financial Ombudsman Service about any alleged mis-selling by lenders. The Financial Conduct Authority (“FCA“) has announced the final deadline in an attempt to draw … Continue Reading
Background The Court of Appeal has this week handed down judgment in three linked appeals (CGL Group and Others v Royal Bank of Scotland Plc and Others). These concerned interest rate hedging products (“Hedging Products“) that certain smaller businesses (including the Appellants) allege they were required to buy as a condition of loans made to them by three banks (in … Continue Reading
Claims’ Management Companies (“CMCs”) offer legal claims and complaint management services to members of the public. Historically, CMCs work to bring large numbers of complaints against financial services companies and recent areas of focus have been PPI and interest rate hedging mis-selling complaints. Whilst some CMCs are reputable, others try to rally business through unsolicited calls/texts … Continue Reading
On 4 July 2017, the Prudential Regulation Authority (“PRA”) released a statement on consumer credit (“Statement”), following a review of consumer credit lending (“PRA Review”). The review included the examination of PRA regulated firms’ underwriting practices for credit cards, unsecured personal loans and motor finance. As readers will be aware, there has been a good deal … Continue Reading
The UK Government appears for the time being at least to have scrapped plans to merge the Serious Fraud Office (“SFO”) with the National Crime Agency (“NCA”). The controversial proposal to abolish the SFO did not feature in the Queen’s Speech, suggesting that it has been put on the back burner following the failure of Prime Minister … Continue Reading
Background Our previous blog piece (20 September 2016) described how, in 2007, the EU found that MasterCard’s Multilateral Interchange Fees (“MIFs“) were unfairly high. This decision was applicable to cross-border transactions using MasterCard and Maestro cards in the European Economic Area (“EEA“). The finding was that Mastercard’s MIF breached Article 101 of the Treaty on the … Continue Reading
In a previous blog post, we discussed how the Financial Conduct Authority (“FCA“) was backing a call by the banks for the introduction of a two year cut-off for PPI claims. Deadline The FCA has now announced that the final deadline for making a new PPI complaint will be 29 August 2019. Andrew Bailey (Chief … Continue Reading
Financial institutions often receive a subject access request made under the Data Protection Act 1998 (“SAR”) from individual customers as pre-cursor to a formal complaint or a legal claim. That is because a SAR enables the customer to access a significant amount of information held by the organisation about him or her. A customer can … Continue Reading
AIG Europe Limited v Woodman and others [2017] UKSC 18 Supreme Court clarifies the correct interpretation of the aggregation clause contained in the Solicitors’ Minimum Terms and Conditions of Insurance (“MTC”) in what will be considered a partial victory for insurers.… Continue Reading
The recent case of R (Aviva Life and Pensions) v Financial Ombudsman Service discusses and reaffirms the position that the Financial Ombudsman is not bound to follow the law when making its determinations but must instead make decisions that are “fair and reasonable in all the circumstances”. This reaffirms the Court of Appeal decision in R (Heather Moor … Continue Reading
After a 38 day trial, Mrs Justice Asplin handed down a 187 page judgment just before Christmas in the long-running Property Alliance Group Ltd v The Royal Bank of Scotland plc case. She rejected claims of mis-selling, breach of good faith obligations and misrepresentations associated with LIBOR. Property Alliance Group sued RBS over four interest … Continue Reading
(This article was first published on Lexis®PSL Banking & Finance. Click for a free trial of Lexis®PSL) What was the appeal about? Credit Suisse Asset Management (“CSAM”) was the originator of Titan 2006-1, a commercial mortgage backed securitization (“CMBS”). The Titan 2006-1 SPV (“Titan”) issued eight tranches of bonds (A to H) for a total of EUR 723 million. It used the proceeds to … Continue Reading
Mr Marsden was in the business of buying, restoring and selling pubs and hotels, financed by loans from Barclays. In July 2006 he entered into an interest rate swap with the bank to hedge floating rate loans of £1.6 million advanced to buy two pubs in Suffolk and Derby (£750,000 and £850,000 respectively). The swap … Continue Reading
Class Actions in the UK Class actions have long been a feature of the US legal landscape. But until October 2015 there was no genuine “class action” procedure in the UK. Then the Consumer Rights Act 2015 (“CRA“) introduced collective proceedings that can be brought in the Competition Appeal Tribunal (“CAT“) by representatives of consumers … Continue Reading
In our blog post “Shift towards a PPI cut-off deadline reported” (24 June), we explained that internal documents had revealed that the FCA was backing a call by banks for the introduction of a two year cut-off for new PPI claims. The official FCA announcement was made on 2 August 2016. It confirmed that the … Continue Reading
Forex hit the headlines once again in late July, after the arrest of HSBC global head of forex cash trading (Mark Johnson) at JFK airport in New York. The US Department of Justice alleges that Mr Johnson (and Stuart Scott, who was HSBC’s head of forex cash trading for Europe, the Middle East and Africa … Continue Reading
Background The Upper Tribunal (Tax and Chancery Chamber) hears references from decisions and supervisory notices issued by the Financial Conduct Authority (“FCA”) and other specified regulators. In this case three references were made by two former employees of Deutsche Bank (Messrs Bittar and Vogt) and a former Barclays Bank employee (Mr Moryoussef). The references related … Continue Reading
Derivatives can be used to hedge, speculate, or a hybrid of the two. An astute gambler may claim his strategy is like a “naked” derivative: a calculated attempt to profit from a mismatch between the odds and the chances of the bet paying out. But is a buyer using derivatives doing the same thing as … Continue Reading
Since the shock Brexit vote on 23 June there have been big movements in a number of financial markets, as participants of all types reposition themselves for the period of uncertainty that the leave vote has ushered in. Regardless of the eventual terms of a UK exit from the EU, market movements that have already happened can be … Continue Reading
As previously reported on this blog, April saw two important judgments in the Titan and Windermere Class X cases. Those decisions have implications for both “CMBS 1.0” structures that include Class X notes in them, and for the wider financial markets in terms of how the courts are approaching disputes over the interpretation of finance … Continue Reading
