$2 BILLION CLAIM RESULTS IN £1 DAMAGES AND ADVERSE COSTS ORDER

On 23 March 2017, Picken J handed down judgment in Plantation Holdings (FZ) LLC v Dubai Islamic Bank PJSC [2017] EWHC 520 (Comm), the case having been tried between October and December 2016. William Edwards acted for the defendant bank, led by Robert Anderson QC and instructed by Baker McKenzie.

Plantation claimed US$2 billion in damages, alleging that the bank had committed a repudiatory breach of a Restructuring Agreement entered into in August 2007  by enforcing against security provided pursuant to the agreement in circumstances in which an event entitling it do so had not arisen. Picken J held that although the bank was not entitled to act as it did when it did, it would inevitably have been entitled to do so some months later, had not committed a repudiatory breach, and Plantation had suffered no loss. In the event, Picken J entirely dismissed Plantation’s causation case, entered judgment against the bank for nominal damages of £1, and ordered Plantation to pay 70% of the Bank’s costs on the indemnity basis.