Services
Comprehensive legal support for Special Situations, assisting investors,
companies and institutions, law firms, office-holders and creditors.
We offer comprehensive legal support for Special Situations, both contentious and non-contentious. You benefit from decades of combined experience in all areas of cross-border restructuring, insolvency and distressed investments – and our focus on quality, agility and cost effectiveness.
Investors
At the early stage of the investment cycle, we assist with preparing the business case for internal approvals. This can include carrying out a credit review; acting as an expert sounding board or outside in-house counsel; identifying risks and analysing them; providing strategic guidance on unlocking value and the timeline for doing so; and working through insolvency and restructuring scenarios to assess possible recovery rates. It can also require the purchase of a so-called “information piece” of debt using LMA, LSTA or more bespoke distressed trading and settlement documentation.
Once the investment is made, we can act as counsel throughout its lifecycle. For a financial institution, this can include assisting with the purchase of individual – or a portfolio of – non-performing loans, within or outside an auction process.
We work as company counsel for a board or act as conflicts counsel for individual directors. Working alongside an in-house corporate counsel if relevant, we identify, monitor and minimise potential liabilities – including providing so-called “zone of insolvency” advice.
For shareholders and owners, we assist with structuring and executing a strategy to safeguard interests, including identifying, monitoring and minimising potential liabilities. For financial institutions, this can also include advising on non-performing loans. We can organise ad-hoc groups of shareholders or act as individual counsel to a shareholder member of an organised ad-hoc group.
Companies & institutions
Legal advisers
DCQ Legal has few conflicts. We therefore work alongside other law firms to front certain contentious matters or act as conflicts counsel for individual stakeholders (such as individual board directors or individual companies in a group structure, or, on the creditor side, either individual creditors or separate ad-hoc groups of creditors in a complex capital structure). We work in close partnership with law firms, helping strengthen your client relationships and give your team added flexibility.
We assist UK and foreign office-holders, including administrators, liquidators and receivers. Our UK office-holder services include claw-back actions; avoiding antecedent transactions, including preferences and transactions at an undervalue; and pursuing directors’ liability claims.
For foreign office-holders, we assist with obtaining recognition and relief under the EC Regulation, the UNCITRAL Model Law (enacted in the UK as the Cross-Border Insolvency Regulations 2006) and English common law provisions.
Office-holders
Added expertise, added value
We have an extensive network of relevant relationships in the UK and abroad, including stakeholders; financial, legal and other advisers; office-holders; trade bodies; regulators and other players involved in Special Situations.
Depending on the nature of the matter – and in consultation with you – we supplement our core team as required to best serve your specific needs.
