The London Commercial Court found in favour of UC RUSAL, the world's largest aluminum producer, declaring the purported sale of the 3.99% stake in February 2018 by Crispian to Whiteleave in MMC Norilsk Nickel "invalid and ineffective".

Following a speedy trial in May, Mr Justice Phillips ruled that the original offer to buy back the shares was not made by "a bona fide third party purchaser", excluding all parties to the shareholder agreement, as well as parties or structures acting in concert with them, from purchasing a stake in MMC Norilsk Nickel.  

The court's decision fully confirmed the validity of UC RUSAL's objections to the purported sale.

The UC RUSAL team was led by EPAM and Macfarlanes LLP.

At EPAM, member of the Partners' Committee Dimitry Afanasiev, Partners Robin Wittering and Evgeny Raschevsky, and Counsel Andrey Mashkovtsev, were the lead team working closely with the UC RUSAL’s head of legal, Petr Maksimov and CEO Vladislav Soloviev.  

Macfarlanes' Partners Simon Nurney and Iain Mackie, and Senior Counsel Joanna Constantis represented UC RUSAL in the Commercial Court.

Maitland Chambers’ Christopher Pymont QC, David Mumford QC, Thomas Munby and James Kinman were the counsel team for UC RUSAL.