Blackstone Asia Real Estate Partners Limited (In Liquidation) and others

Two foreign companies in liquidation, Blackstone Asia Real Estate Partners Limited and Brazen Sky Limited, together with their joint liquidators Angela Barkhouse and Toni Shukla, applied in Singapore for standing to bring avoidance claims under ss 238 and 239 of the Insolvency, Restructuring and Dissolution Act 2018 (IRDA). Their foreign proceedings had been recognised under the Singapore version of the UNCITRAL Model Law on Cross-Border Insolvency, enacted through s 252 and the Third Schedule of the IRDA.

In Summons No 1789 of 2025, Blackstone sought to pursue claims concerning payments through an account with Standard Chartered Bank (Singapore) Limited; it was alleged that these transactions involved substantial fraud. In Summons No 810 of 2025, Brazen Sky sought to pursue BSI Bank Limited and several of its employees. Brazen Sky and its parent, 1Malaysia Development Berhad, were also suing BSI and the bankers in a separate claim for dishonest assistance arising from the same transactions.

All the transactions occurred before the Model Law came into force in Singapore. The two summonses were heard separately but decided in one judgment, and the court directed that only the question of standing be argued.

1. Whether Art 23(9) of the Singapore Model Law bars foreign representatives from bringing avoidance claims over transactions entered into before the Model Law came into force.
2. Whether the court's power under Art 21(1)(g) to grant additional relief allows it to give such standing despite Art 23(9).

The court applied the three-step approach to statutory interpretation in Tan Cheng Bock v Attorney-General [2017] 2 SLR 850. Because Art 23(9) does not appear in the UNCITRAL text and was a conscious departure from it, harmonious reading with other jurisdictions was not relevant; the plain words and Parliament's intention governed.

On its text, Art 23(9) disapplies paragraph 1, which is what gives a foreign representative standing to bring avoidance applications, for any transaction entered into before the law came into force. However broad Art 21(1)(g) appears, it must be read subject to the other articles, and nothing in either provision lifts the former over the latter. Parliament did not need to cross-refer to other provisions; what paragraph 1 grants, paragraph 9 removes in a defined situation. The express leave mechanism in Art 23(6) suggested that Parliament did not intend the Art 23 limits to be overridden through Art 21(1)(g). The earlier orders in Re Zetta Jet Pte Ltd [2019] 4 SLR 1343 and unreported cases had been made unopposed and without full argument.

On purpose, the Singapore implementation aims at efficient cross-border insolvency but with local modifications, and nothing in the parliamentary materials or committee reports supported reading Art 23(9) as removing only automatic standing. A commentary in an annotated guide indicated the provision protects parties' expectations against retrospective challenge. The possibility of local parallel proceedings did not alter that. United States and United Kingdom materials did not assist. The court found it unnecessary to decide the arguments on retrospectivity or the overlap with the separate claim. It acknowledged that the result left the applicants without easy recourse over apparently dubious transactions, but held that it had to give effect to the law Parliament enacted.

Aidan Xu J dismissed both applications. The foreign representatives had no standing to pursue avoidance actions against the banks or the bankers over transactions entered into before the Singapore Model Law commenced, and the court could not confer that standing under Art 21(1)(g).