Security required for Bitcoin claim
Two applications for security for costs. The claimant claimed against fifteen overseas residents requiring a re-write of cryotocurrency systems so that he could recover sums he said were due to him in respect of Bitcoin assets which he said have been deleted after presumably being copied by hackers. The defendants argued that they had no such duty, and requested security for their costs before the case continued. The claimant did not maintain a bank account or file tax returns or trading accounts in the UK and was therefore impecunious.
Held: The order was made. The claimant could not claim as an asset the subject matter of the claim. Any such claim was at issue, and the security was required now. Other possible ways of satisfying the need for security would require extensive work from the defendants which was without any basis in law.
Master Clark
[2022] EWHC 2 (Ch)
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Re Unisoft Group (No 2) 1993
Inability to pay means to pay when the costs fall due for payment . .
Cited – Jirehouse Capital and Another v Beller and Another CA 30-Jul-2008
Appeal against refusal of order for security for costs. . .
Cited – Chemistree Homecare Limited v Teva Pharmaceuticals Ltd ChD 2011
On requesting security for costs from a claimant said to be impecunious, the applicant must show that, on all the material presently available to the court, there is reason to believe that the claimant will be unable to pay the applicant’s costs if . .
Cited – Longstaff International Ltd v Baker Mckenzie ChD 16-Jun-2004
A request for security for costs based upon impecuniosity calls for an assessment of what the claimant may be expected to have available for payment at the due date or dates in the form of cash or other readily realisable assets. . .
Cited – Chuku v Chuku ChD 17-Mar-2017
Newey J held that: ‘i) A person with a significant interest in the outcome of a claim will rarely, if ever, be considered a ‘nominal claimant’ within CPR 25.13(2)(f);
ii) A personal interest is not, however, essential. While a trustee, . .
Cited – Bestfort Developments Llp and Others v Ras Al Khaimah Investment Authority and Others CA 8-Nov-2016
Whether threshold conditions met for grant of order for security for costs.
Held: The approach adopted should be simple and not ‘over-burdened by technical and semantic arguments relating to the construction of the ‘threshold’ test’ . .
Cited – Sarpd Oil International Ltd v Addax Energy Sa and Another CA 3-Mar-2016
appeal about security for costs.
Held: Where a foreign company is reticent in revealing, or declines to reveal its financial position, it is ‘sound’ practice to grant security against it: ‘ If a company is given every opportunity to show that . .
Cited – Autoweld Systems Ltd v Kito Enterprises Llc CA 17-Dec-2010
In the civil sphere a claim for security for costs is invariably made in a costs-follow-the-event regime. Black LJ stated: ‘it must be borne in mind that the design of the rules is to protect a defendant (or a claimant placed in a similar position . .
Cited – Compagnie Noga D’Importation Et D’Exportation Sa v Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Ltd and others ComC 18-Nov-2004
Langley J held a ‘nominal claimant’ to be ‘one whose name is used to bring a claim in which he does not have any or at least any significant legal or beneficial interest’. . .
Cited – De Beers Consolidated Mines Ltd v Howe, Surveyor of Taxes HL 1905
The appellant Company was registered in the Cape Colony and it’s business was mining for diamonds in mines which it possessed in South Africa, and selling the diamonds there under annual contracts to a syndicate for delivery there. The Head Office . .
Cited – Revenue and Customs v Development Securities Plc and Others CA 15-Dec-2020
Appeal from finding in tax planning scheme. As to the residence of the scheme: ‘i) The overarching principle is that a company resides for tax purposes where its real business is carried on, and that is where CMC actually abides;
ii) The . .
Cited – Swedish Central Railway v Thompson HL 1925
A corporation may have more than one residence. Lord Cave after citing De Beers said: ‘The central management and control of a company may be divided, and it may ‘keep house and do business’ in more than one place; and if so, it may have more than . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Costs
Updated: 18 January 2022; Ref: scu.671240