Syedur Rahman assesses the importance of a UK court’s decision to dismiss Denmark’s case against a British hedge fund trader

The significance of a London judge’s dismissal of Denmark's £1.5 billion dividend tax fraud case against British hedge fund trader Sanjay Shah was assessed by Syed Rahman.

Syed made it clear that the judgment could prove to be a blow to Cum-Ex investigations where UK traders may be involved. He believes the case will have “a serious knock-on effect’’ on any investigations into institutions and individuals that operated in London and carried out dividend arbitrage schemes in European countries.

According to Syed, the nature of Cum-Ex trading makes it nearly impossible for one jurisdiction to investigate what happened.

But although the High Court has dismissed the Danish claim, it is likely that an appeal will be brought against the ruling. The grounds for appeal could include arguing that this is not a tax claim in a foreign jurisdiction.

An appeal could involve focusing on issues relating to the withholding tax refund model that used share transactions to contrive multiple ownership of shares in order to facilitate refunds from European tax authorities. Any such appeal would need to establish why Mr Shah should be a defendant in England.

Syed's comments featured in Bloomberg (subscription required) and Securities Finance Times.