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Hedge funds and other big investors are set to regain $11 billion (£6.6 billion) which was frozen by administrators of Lehman Brothers' London-based European business, if over 90% approve a new asset repayment plan.
Administrator PricewaterhouseCoopers is today writing to former Lehman clients — including about 900 European investment funds — with details of a “claim resolution agreement”.
The new plan comes after the Court of Appeal last month rejected the administrator's request for a scheme of arrangement - a legal tool where fundholders give up their right to individual claims and allow PwC to split up the pot in the fairest way.
If today's payment plan is turned down, PwC's Steven Pearson said “it could take years to ultimately return all client assets.”
The assets have been frozen since Lehman's bankruptcy filing in September 2008. At that point, it held $35 billion of hedge-fund clients' assets. PwC has so far returned about $13.3 billion.
