At least until late 2008, Mr Kemsley was a very wealthy individual. On 25 June 2008, Barclays granted him a personal loan of £5 million on an unsecured basis. The loan was repayable after a year but the loan period was subsequently extended. In 2009, Mr Kemsley’s business in England collapsed when his group of companies went into administration. Mr Kemsley was unable to keep up repayment to Barclays of instalments under the extended loan, and failed to stick to a repayment schedule for debts with another company. Mr Kemsley is a British citizen and had lived until 2009 in England. Following the collapse of his business here, he moved in June 2009 with his wife and family to Florida. They moved to New York City in about May 2010 but subsequently Mr and Mrs Kemsley became estranged and Mrs Kemsley moved back with their children to England in about June 2012. Mr Kemsley has remained in the United States.
On 13 January 2012, Mr Kemsley presented his bankruptcy petition to the High Court. His petition was based on his physical presence in England on the date of presentation, within the terms of the Insolvency Act 1986, and on his having had a place of residence in England within three years of presentation. On 26 March 2012, he was declared bankrupt on the basis of the EU’s Insolvency Regulation. On 1 March 2012, shortly before Mr Kemsley became bankrupt, Barclays commenced proceedings against him under the loan agreement in the Supreme Court of the State of New York. On 21 August 2012, he applied in the US Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York under Chapter 15 of the US Bankruptcy Code for recognition of the English bankruptcy as a foreign main proceeding.
In the English case discussed in this post, Mr Kemsley seeks to restrain Barclays from pursuing proceedings in the United States: an anti-suit injunction. The anti-suit injunction was dismissed. The High Court sided in favour of a restrictive approach to ASIs in the case of bankruptcy, per precedent. It found that the US court was best placed to decide on COMI in the US.
The US bankruptcy court refused to recognise K’s UK bankruptcy as a foreign main or nonmain proceeding under chapter 15. The court held that K’s COMI needed to be adjudged as at the time of his English bankruptcy filing, not the time of the chapter 15 filing. Rejecting K’s statement at the time of his UK bankruptcy filing, the court found that his COMI was in the US at that time, focusing on K’s habitual place of residence and that of his family.
EU readers may be surprised that the High Court even considers an ASI, given the EU’s aversion to ASIs in the area of conflict of laws, post Gasser and Turner. However the High Court evidently must have considered the English court’s duties under and loyalties to the Insolvency Regulation fully met with the previous finding of insolvency. The current proceedings in that understanding fall outside that remit. Moreover, the aversion to anti-suit injunctions arguably only holds vis-a-vis fellow EU courts.
Of note are also the apparent limits to the international harmonisation of COMI as things stand.
Geert.
