Alexander Isaac Hamilton v Mark Colin Barrow

Hearing date: 1 st to 3 rd July 2025

Approved Judgment

Introduction

This case concerns a failed unregulated investment scheme. The investors in the scheme understood that their money would be used in foreign exchange trading. When the scheme collapsed in 2017 many investors were unable to recover their investment.

These proceedings are a sequel to proceedings before Mrs Justice May. In those proceedings the present claimant claimed the amount of his individual investment from the present first, second and fifth defendants. May J gave judgment in his favour: [2023] EWHC 1743. The Court of Appeal gave the first and second defendants limited permission to appeal from that judgment, but dismissed the appeal: [2024] EWCA Civ 888. I understand May J's judgment has been satisfied and the final costs order is required to be paid by 31 ^st December 2025.

The claimant now brings proceedings against a wider group of defendants. He does so under one hundred and one assignments from other investors. On 21 ^st October 2024, Master Thornett gave permission to serve the claim form on the eight defendants who were at that time resident out of the jurisdiction.

I am concerned with a series of eight applications which I heard on 1 ^st to 3 ^rd July 2025. I gave the first and second defendants 14 days to file additional submissions on one issue if they wished to do so. They availed themselves of that opportunity. The claimant replied to those submissions on 31 ^st July 2025. The third and fourth defendants filed further submissions on 15 ^th August 2025.

A bare outline of the scheme, the judgment of Mrs Justice May and the parties to the present proceedings

In order to understand the parties to the present proceedings, it is necessary to provide a bare outline of the investment scheme at this stage and to set out some of the findings of Mrs Justice May.

Schedule A to the Particulars of Claim sets out the names and addresses of each assignor and the amount each invested. The smallest amount is £ 2,930; the largest is £ 410, 969. Over half the sums are less than £ 50,000 and nearly one quarter between £ 50,000 and £ 100,000.

The majority of the addresses in Schedule A are in the United Kingdom. The next most common location of the assignors (with twenty two) is Cyprus. There are also assignors in Australia, Ireland, Singapore, Thailand, the United States of America, and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. I was told in the hearing that people from all over the world invested. The evidence before Mrs Justice May was that there were thousands of investors.

The basic outline of the scheme was that investors paid their money to a ‘currency club’. The funds were then to be traded in foreign currency by a third party, the twelfth defendant to the present proceedings, who was based in Malaysia. Although a series of bank accounts was used to receive investor funds over time, the most important accounts used by the club to receive investor funds were in the names of two Seychelles companies at the Bank of China in Macao: IIMM International Ltd (‘IIMM’) and Marela International Services Ltd (‘Marela’).

Mrs Justice May found that the currency club was a partnership between the first and second defendants and a series of section or ‘club’ leaders, of which the present fifth defendant was one. She found that the present fifth defendant had made a series of fraudulent misrepresentations to the claimant about how his money was to be dealt with, which misrepresentations had been relied on by the claimant when deciding to invest. She also found that there was a contract between the claimant and the partnership which included terms as to how investors' money was to be handled and that the present fifth defendant would use reasonable skill and care in administering the invested funds and reporting to investors. May J expressed surprise at the paucity of written communications or records given the scale of the club operation. She found the three defendants before her jointly and severally liable for damages arising from misrepresentation and breach of contract.

Mrs Justice May did not find that the claimant's case in the tort of conspiracy was made out in the evidence before her. She noted that the claimant had indicated in his closing that he was no longer pursuing his pleaded trust claim.

The single judge, Lord Justice Phillips, in refusing the present fifth defendant permission to appeal against Mrs Justice May's findings of fact, said: “ The case in fraud against the third defendant was overwhelming.”

The parties to the current proceedings are as follows:

(a) the claimant is a former English solicitor. He resigned from the roll in 2004. Since then, he has engaged in property development and investment. He lives in Cyprus. He invested a total of US$ 698,888 in the scheme. He represented himself at the trial before May J and in the Court of Appeal. He also represented himself before me, although he submitted two skeleton arguments signed by counsel;

(b) the first and second defendants are husband and wife. The first defendant began the currency club after providing the twelfth defendant with some of his own money to invest and having seen the return. Before starting the currency club he was an independent financial advisor. He met the twelfth defendant while the first and second defendants were working for the same firm as the twelfth defendant in Kuala Lumpur. Investors' monies were initially paid into the bank accounts of the first and/or second defendants at Standard Chartered Bank and then into the account of one of the first defendant's companies (Blanmont Consulting Limited) at Standard Bank in the Isle of Man. It was when that bank asked that this account be closed, that the IIMM account began to be used. The first defendant explains in his fourth witness statement from the prior proceedings that the second defendant was appointed a director and later a shareholder of IIMM. They initially lived in the United Kingdom, settled in Cyprus between 2005 and 2011 and lived in Malaysia from 2012 to 2015. They are currently retired and live in Portugal. They were represented by Hugo Page KC and Madeline Dixon, both in the previous proceedings and before me;

(c) the third and fourth defendants are also husband and wife. The third defendant is the first defendant's brother-in-law. He accepts in his witness statement for these applications that he was a club leader and at least for a short period investors paid money to him directly. The Particulars of Claim allege that the fourth defendant was also a partner in the currency club, although she denies this. The Particulars of Claim allege that the third and fourth defendants were directors and majority shareholders of Cool Mentor Consulting Limited, which opened a bank account at OCBC Bank in Singapore that was also used to receive investor funds. Both defendants say that they were “in the UK throughout”. They remain living in England. They were represented before me by Mr Bell;

(d) the fifth and sixth defendants are husband and wife. They are long-time friends of the first and second defendants. As set out above, May J found that the fifth defendant was a partner in the ‘currency club’. The Particulars of Claim allege that the sixth defendant was also a partner in the currency club. The fifth and sixth defendants' joint witness statement for the present applications says that the fifth defendant incorporated Marela and he may have operated its bank account at Bank of China. At the time of the operation of the currency club they lived in Cyprus. They now live in England. Neither defendant was represented before me. The fifth defendant made submissions on behalf of himself and the sixth defendant;

(e) the seventh defendant was served with the proceedings and has filed an acknowledgement of service stating that he intends to contest jurisdiction. He did not appear at the hearing and was not represented. He did not file any documents. The Particulars of Claim allege that he was a club leader. That he was a club leader is supported by the evidence of the first and third defendants. IIMM appears to have been his company at least initially and he appears to have operated its bank account at Bank of China. He lives in Malaysia;

(f) the eighth and ninth defendants are husband and wife. Prior to their involvement in the currency club they were clients of the first defendant as an IFA. The eighth defendant is a cousin of the tenth defendant. The Particulars of Claim allege that the eighth defendant was a club leader and the ninth defendant a partner in the currency club. The allegation that the eighth defendant was a club leader is supported by the evidence of the first and third defendants. The joint skeleton argument of the eighth and tenth defendants states that the eighth and tenth defendants administered one of the sections of the club that the first defendant divided the overall club into. Neither defendant was represented before me. The eighth defendant made submissions on behalf of himself and the ninth defendant. They also relied on the...