Hugh Dickson

Grant Thornton

Cayman Islands www.grantthornton.ky

hugh.dickson@uk.gt.com Tel: +1 345 769 7203

Biography

Hugh heads Grant Thornton’s restructuring and recovery practice, covering 140 jurisdictions. With over 35 years of experience he is recognised as an innovative expert in the sector. Hugh’s experience includes roles for the IMF, World Bank, and EU, as well as eight national governments. He has travelled to over 110 countries, having lived as a resident in 10 of those. Whilst struck by the similarities in asset recovery between jurisdictions, he notes the critical importance of local knowledge.

What inspired you to specialise in restructuring and insolvency proceedings?

A secondment to the corporate recovery division in my first year as a trainee accountant, primarily involved in trading receiverships. The responsibility and challenges in trying to operate and save a distressed business were night and day compared to the audit work I initially started with. A baptism of fire, but wonderful experience in everything from building management skills, managing stress and complex problems to personal satisfaction when you succeeded in rescuing a business and recovering value for creditors.

What’s been your most interesting case to date, and why?

The Saad case, where I was one of the joint liquidators on several of the entities involved. Quite apart from the sheer size – we hope to recover over $1 billion in assets across the various entities – it was a massively complex fraud case, with assets and cross-border asset recovery operations involving more than 10 jurisdictions and a wide spectrum of asset types, all in the face of extremely limited records given wholesale record destruction and the initial lack of cooperation and then collapse of the group’s centralised back-office function. If that wasn’t enough, a proprietary tracing claim coupled with a worldwide freezing order against the entirety of the group’s assets. It also spun off some of the most interesting litigation I have seen in my career. Contested claims over assets, damages actions against the fraudsters and those that abetted them, cross-border recognition applications and complex disputes over financial transactions. These included cases going to the supreme courts of four countries, with landmark decisions that have changed law or practice such as the Daiwa Quincecare finding, the limitations on the practical implementation of the first model law recognition application in Australia, and the decision limiting a liquidator’s ability to request the provision of investigatory or other statutory powers available in another jurisdiction where they have recognition but no parallel proceeding.

How do you coordinate on cases when working alongside experts with other areas of expertise?

It’s no different to managing any complex operation where you need expertise in a subject you may not have a complete command of and need to draw on a wide variety of groups, often with highly specific skill sets. You make sure you operate as a team, with inclusion of a lead representative from each discipline involved in all core meetings and discussions, as their expertise may fundamentally affect the success or conduct of the wider plan. You need to ensure you understand core issues – in particular any requirements or limitations that might impact the work of individual specialists – but the primary goal is to have good communication within the team to ensure that the plan and the way the case is managed draws upon the strengths and contribution of each discipline whilst deconflicting or mitigating any potential conflicts. Ultimately you as the appointment holder make the final decisions, but you do so based on expert advice.

What trends are you noticing in restructurings and asset recovery following the withdrawal of covid-related government support across different jurisdictions?

I think most practitioners had been expecting a surge in formal insolvency cases, but we are not seeing that – at least, not yet. Initially it was easy to ascribe that to a combination of government subvention and emergency moratoria, but we haven’t seen a major increase in cases in those jurisdictions where these have been eased or removed. I think that is down to a combination of concern on creditors’ part that formal proceedings will not recover value because of a depressed market for assets – especially in certain highly distressed sectors – and perhaps an acceleration of a trend that was seen pre covid-19 – a reluctance to engage in formal proceedings because of a concern around costs and time taken to resolve insolvencies. There has also been plenty of liquidity, as market demand for more traditional borrowing has reduced, leading to increased willingness by funders to engage with riskier funding. As long as there is a combination of new money willing to take risks and a reluctance by original lenders to enforce, insolvencies and restructuring can be staved off. Whether that situation can continue absent a major uplift in the global economy generally and distressed industries specifically is questionable, particularly in light of the additional strains being imposed by emerging inflation, energy prices, increased interest rates and the strains placed on supply chains. I think a major increase in some form of intervention into distressed business will be inevitable, but if I were a betting man, I think the focus will be on refinancing and corporate restructurings absent formal, court supervised proceedings. I think we will see more “rescue” scenarios with insolvency specialists employed – contractually rather than court appointed - as the gate keepers and managers of the new monies’ economic interests than formal insolvencies and restructurings.

What is the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?

You are only as good as your team. Delegate as much responsibility for workstreams as they can manage, but always remember that you can delegate authority but not responsibility. You get the recognition for the successes, but you get to take the blame for the things that don’t go so well too! If you trust your team and communicate well, you will collectively achieve so much more and much faster, and at the same time build your team members into the future leaders of the practice.

Peers and clients say: “Hugh is a highly rated expert in the Cayman Islands” “A leading insolvency and asset recovery expert”