BUSINESSMAN SEÁN Quinn, who last Friday told a court in Belfast that he had assets of less than £50,000 (€58,300) and no income, has an option to buy back the shares owned by his children in Quinn Group companies before he is 70, according to documents filed in the High Court yesterday.
The documents were filed by lawyers representing the State-owned Irish Bank Resolution Corporation (IBRC), formerly Anglo Irish Bank.
IBRC is battling with the children and other family members of Mr Quinn for the right to ownership of certain potentially valuable Quinn Group assets in foreign jurisdictions.
Mr Quinn and his family owe IBRC up to €2.9 billion.
The claim by IBRC’s lawyers suggests that Mr Quinn could regain ownership of these assets. He will be 64 next month.
“The plaintiff [IBRC] understands that the Quinn children are the ultimate beneficial owners of all of the Quinn Group companies,” the affidavit on behalf of IBRC stated.
“The majority of the value is in the manufacturing and insurance company, and the holding company there is Quinn Group (ROI) Ltd. The plaintiff bank has enforced its share charged which the Quinn family are seeking to set aside. Seán Quinn was previously the owner of these shares, and it is the plaintiff’s consistent understanding that there exists a shareholders’ agreement between Seán Quinn and his children whereby he can exercise an option over those shares before he turns 70 years of age.”
The bank also claims Mr Quinn has been assisting his children with their legal actions against it and with their attempts to retain control of certain companies.
Mr Quinn remains a director of certain companies where the bank has been “thwarted” in seeking to enforce its security, it is alleged.
No comment was available from the Quinn family last night.
IBRC also told the High Court that Mr Quinn’s claim before the Northern Ireland courts of having his business address at Derrylin, Co Fermanagh, is “seriously at odds” with information available to his largest creditor, IBRC, the Commercial Court was told.
IBRC claims that, since it enforced its security over loans and since Mr Quinn’s removal from the boards of Quinn Group (NI) Ltd in April 2010 and from Quinn Insurance Ltd in March 2010, he has been living at Greagrahan, Ballyconnell, Co Cavan, and operating from offices at a disused tyre factory at Belturbet, Co Cavan.
This and other information available to the bank provides a basis to challenge Mr Quinn’s adjudication of bankruptcy by the Northern Ireland courts last Friday, the bank claims.
Mr Quinn, it said, had consistently indicated his home is at Greagrahan, including in annual returns for 95 companies registered in the Republic of which he was a director and for 52 companies registered in Britain and Northern Ireland of which he was a director.
Mr Quinn now holds 14 directorships of companies registered in the Republic and no directorships in any active UK companies.
Patricia Quinn, wife of Mr Quinn, had also indicated her home is at Greagrahan in proceedings by herself and her children against IBRC in which they claim that guarantees provided by them over loans of more than €2.3 billion are invalid.
The bank said it has served a large number of demands on Mr Quinn personally at Greagrahan and most of those demands had been accepted at that address. On no occasion had Mr Quinn later argued his address was not Greagrahan, it said.
Mr Quinn and his son Seán jnr initially co-operated with accepting service of legal documents at the Greagrahan address during the early weeks of the bank’s enforcement of its security but that relationship had broken down, the bank said. It had then moved to serve Mr Quinn personally at the Belturbet premises.
