In a recent judgment, the High Court held that a clause in a settlement agreement requiring immediate payment of all outstanding amounts in the event of a late payment (an acceleration clause) was capable of falling within the penalty doctrine, but an obligation to pay a daily sum accruing pro rata on any outstanding amounts … Read more

The Board of the Privy Council has allowed an appeal in relation to the application of the so-called “reflective loss” principle, confirming that the rule falls to be assessed as at the point in time when a claimant suffers loss and not at the time proceedings are brought Primeo Fund v Bank of Bermuda (Cayman) … Read more

The Supreme Court has overturned a Court of Appeal decision which held that a clause providing for liquidated damages for delay did not apply where the contractor had failed to complete the contracted work: Triple Point Technology, Inc. v PTT Public Company Ltd [2021] UKSC 29. The Supreme Court’s decision restores the orthodox interpretation of … Read more

A recent High Court decision has given a helpful analysis of the consequences that follow from delivering off-specification oil: Galtrade Limited v BP Oil International Limited [2021] EWHC 1796 (Comm). The underlying facts of the case come up quite often in practice, although reported decisions are less frequent. A seller delivered off-spec hydrocarbons (in this … Read more

The Court of Appeal has allowed an appeal by a purchaser in the context of its claim for damages for fraudulent misrepresentation against the sellers of certain business assets that it had acquired. In doing so, the Court of Appeal held that damages for fraudulent misrepresentation should, as a general rule, be assessed by ascertaining … Read more

The Court of Appeal has held that accessories who were jointly and severally liable with a principal as joint tortfeasors were liable to account only for the profits which they themselves had made from the wrongful acts, and not those profits made by the principal: Equities CV v Ahmed [2021] EWCA Civ 675. This gives … Read more

The Court of Appeal has struck out Quincecare duty and dishonest assistance claims brought by the liquidators of a company operating a Ponzi scheme against a correspondent bank that operated various accounts for the company. In doing so, the Court of Appeal confirmed that the scope of the Quincecare duty, which may arise in the … Read more

The Court of Appeal has substantially upheld the first instance decisions in a lengthy piece of ongoing litigation relating to a joint business venture for the exploitation of oil-extraction technology, illustrating the potentially severe consequences fiduciaries face where they put themselves in a position of a conflict of interests: Gray v Global Energy Horizons Corp … Read more