Company
Re Nostrum Oil & Gas plc [2022] EWHC 2249 (Ch), [2022] All ER (D) 02 (Sep)
The Chancery Division allowed the application, pursuant to the Companies Act 2006 Pt 26, for an order sanctioning a scheme of arrangement (the scheme) between the applicant, the parent company of a corporate group which operates an oil and gas business in Kazakhstan, and its scheme creditors, a number of whom have been made the targets of EU, UK, and US sanctions as a result of the war in Ukraine. As such, those creditors were ‘sanctions disqualified persons’ who had been prohibited from dealing with the two unsecured notes to which the scheme relates. Among other things, the court held that: (i) even if the sanctions disqualified persons had been permitted to vote on the scheme, the statutory majority would have been obtained; (ii) although the scheme consideration would be held for the sanctions disqualified persons on bare trust until they ceased to be subject to sanctions, the scheme was ‘fair’ as it is not uncommon to include some form of holding trust in noteholder
