Bird & Bird today announces that it has been advising special administrators, Andrew Andronikou and Peter Kubik of UHY Hacker Young on the special administration of London-based specialist investment company, Hartmann Capital Limited, which falls within the definition of "investment bank" under the Investment Bank Special Administration Regulations 2011. Hartmann Capital's specific focus was on futures and options, equities and CFDs.

A special administration order in respect of Hartmann Capital Limited was granted on Friday evening during an out of hours hearing after the directors made an urgent application to court the same day.  The application was made after a £1.5 million shortfall in client monies was discovered.

The special administration order is only the sixth such order to have been made since the Investment Bank Special Administration Regulations 2011 came into force in February 2011.  Bird & Bird were also instructed in relation to the fifth such order back in October 2013 when acting for the special administrators of City Equities Limited. Bird & Bird's Restructuring & Insolvency Group's instruction to act for the special administrators of Hartmann Capital adds to the team's strength in the financial services sector: the Group acted for the key data centre provider to MF Global in the first ever special administration, and in addition to acting for the special administrators of City Equities, members of the team also advised the special administrators of one of the other previous special administrations.  Overall, the Group has experience and expertise in this area that is virtually unrivalled.

Joss Hargrave, partner and Head of Bird & Bird's UK Restructuring & Insolvency Group said: "Due to the highly regulated nature of investment banks, these special orders are incredibly rare, indeed this is only the sixth since the new provisions came into effect in 2011. Given the rarity of special administration orders, this is a tremendous testament to the quality of the Group and its ability to handle very complex assignments, particularly in the financial services sector".

Andrew Andronikou of UHY Hacker Young said: “This special administration has been highly challenging and the issues we are facing are of the utmost complexity.  We have been very impressed with Bird & Bird's advice and their ability to find solutions to a variety of difficult problems.”

The Bird & Bird Restructuring & Insolvency Group team advising on this matter is led by Joss Hargrave, James Moore, Martin Sandler and Peter Knight.