Former EMI Owner Terra Firma Loses A U.K. Court Ruling

Guy Hands

In a court date in the U.K., former EMI owners TERRA FIRMA CAPITAL PARTNERS "failed to force the administrators of EMI GROUP to hand over documents about the sale of the music group to CITIGROUP INC. in a deal that caused TERRA FIRMA to lose about 1.85 billion pounds ($2.8 billion)," reports BLOOMBERG.

In FEBRUARY of last year (NET NEWS 2/23/11), GUY HANDS, who lost EMI to CITIGROUP at the beginning of the month, wrote a letter to investors saying he was "hopeful" that they will see their money returned. HANDS' letter also acknowledged that returning the 5.4 billion euros raised by TERRA FIRMA back in 2007 could be a tall order.

"Given the substantial investment by TFCP III in EMI, this will not be easy, but we are encouraged by the prospects of our other investments in the fund and the potential acquisitions that our team are evaluating," HANDS wrote, adding he was "disappointed that we could not reach an agreement with CITIGROUP (despite great efforts from our side) that would have involved us putting in more equity simultaneously with CITIGROUP writing down their debt."

In this current court procedure, HANDS' private equity firm TERRA FIRMA was asking PRICEWATERHOUSECOOPERS LLP for valuation documents because it had "serious concerns about the circumstances surrounding the sale," Judge NICHOLAS WARREN in LONDON said in a ruling.

WARREN ruled against TERRA FIRMA, saying the company had all the information it needed about the valuation of EMI.

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