UK 19:04 Friday, 23 October 2026
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Disclosure: I have no positions in any stocks mentioned, and no plans to initiate any positions within the next 72 hours. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from ShareProphets). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
The Daily Mail applied the coup de Grace for Quindell (QPP) last night with revelations about share sales by Steve Scott, Rob Terry’s second oldest business associate (after Mr Sadiq of Cosy/Himex infamy) and a Quenron NED. This really is devastating.
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Comments
Richard T
Is the clarification note this morning a de facto suicide note by Quenron and its directors? Time for a collapse in the company driven by ‘mis-interpretation’ of a ‘positive’ action? Having to attend all those analysts’ / institutional investor meetings to explain why the company is so good must get very tiring when you know the truth?
As I’ve mentioned elsewhere and which is shown up by the RNS this morning from Quindell, this is a variation on the ‘Employee Benefit Trust’ mechanism.
Let me explain! A company in a low tax – no tax area sends out an invoice for services. These ‘services’ have been provided by an ‘employee’. The company ‘lends’ the employee around 85% – 90% of the invoice value. The ‘employee’ is contractually obliged to repay the loan at some date in the future. But here’s the kicker! The company never asks for repayment. It’s made 10% – 15% on the transaction. The ‘employee’ tells HMRC it’s not received any income from the company and is therefore not going to pay any Income Tax / PAYE, Employers or Employees National Insurance Contributions.
Anyone who has been a contractor in the IT Services area in the last 15 years will have heard of the above ‘scam’. The key to it is the fiction that the employee is obliged to repay the loan to the company. It’s in writing. It’s legal. He / she has to repay the loan. Except the company will never enforce the loan because it ‘loses’ the 10% – 15% it makes on the invoice and collecting the cash.
HMRC are going after a number of high-profile cases. It was one of the reasons behind the collapse of Rangers FC in the 2000s when it became clear Rangers would be liable for the PAYE it should have deducted from football players wages which Rangers had tried to pay via an ‘Employee Benefit Trust’ I believe.
No HMRC for Quenron? Nothing illegal in the process. Who looses……….?
Let me repeat, the legal obligation on RT et al to repay the loans no matter how clear in writing is of no consequence if the Directors of the company making the loan do not in fact take any action. Why would you if you can make £1.5m from the gross proceeds of the sale of the shares based on the nudge and wink that you won’t take any action?
wiggly
The BBMs seem to have gone very quiet . . . .