St Helier Capital Management Ltd is Wound Up by the High Court

St Helier Capital Management Ltd is Wound Up by the High Court.

20 months after one of our clients first filed a winding up petition, St Helier Capital Management Ltd has been wound up by the High Court.

The owner of SHCM, Mr Simon Whittley-Ryan, frustrated the court process on many occasions and was able to drag the case out for almost two years.  We have written about his antics in previous articles.  This time however, he finally ran out of excuses.

At the previous hearing in October 2020 Mr Whittley-Ryan finally accepted the petitioner’s claim was valid.  He told the court the company had the money and would pay up.  The hearing was adjourned until 25^th November 2020 to allow the payment to be made.  At yesterday’s hearing the petitioner informed the court he had received no payment from Simon Whittley-Ryan or St Helier Capital Management Ltd so the Judge filed a Winding Up Order over the company.

Rather than make payment as he had promised, Mr Whittley-Ryan spent the last month threatening legal action against the petitioner for daring to demand that the debt be repaid.  A host of other parties including investors, ourselves, insolvency firms, former partners, former business associates, contractors and others have all received a similar threat over the years.  It’s a message he’ll probably have on his headstone when he dies.

“HERE LIES SIMON WHITTLEY-RYAN.  YOU’LL BE HEARING FROM HIS SOLICITOR”.

Credit has to go to the UK’s Official Receiver.  Less than 24 hours after the Judge issued the Winding Up Order we received an email from the Official Receiver asking us to send through any information we have on SHCM.  That is a pretty quick response.  It may have something to do with this being the fourth Simon Whittley-Ryan investment company forced into liquidation by investors in the last year.  Four companies which received millions of pounds from investors with nothing at all to show for it.

It has been suggested that Simon Whittley-Ryan may be suffering from the rare condition of “Reverse King Midas Syndrome”.  Everything King Midas touched turned to gold, but for those suffering from Reverse King Midas Syndrome everything they touch turns to s**t.

Which leads us very nicely to Simon Whittley’s latest money-losing venture for investors.  Having established a reputation for running s**t businesses, he has decided his next venture will be officially recognised, in advance, as being very much a s**t business.

He is attempting to move into the waste-to-energy sector, or more specifically, anaerobic digestion plants.  Anaerobic digestion is described as “a process through which bacteria break down organic matter – such as manure – without oxygen”.  It looks like his Covid-19 business has been put on ice for a while [nice vaccine reference there].

Mr Whittley-Ryan is the owner of Folium Energy Ltd and Natural Capital Holdings Ltd.  He was formerly a director of Natural Capital Energy Ltd, but fell out with his partners over the fundraising which ended in a parting of the ways.  We are told Mr Whittley-Ryan’s fundraising proposal raised red flags with his partners.  The proposed investment was a $200m ‘asset-backed’ bond which was allegedly using precious gemstones as security for investors’ capital.  The bond issuer was listed as Petra Asset Management Ltd.  We contacted Petra Asset Management Ltd on two occasions to ask them what due diligence they had undertaken on the assets which were allegedly backing the bond and on Simon Whittley-Ryan himself.  They did not respond.

Simon Whittley-Ryan has absolutely no experience of anaerobic digestion plants.  We have been advised by three independent sources that he is working with Paul Winter Consulting.  We have also been advised that Paul Winter was made aware of Mr Whittley-Ryan’s history of defaulting on investment products, but at that time only three companies had been wound up by investors.  The fourth one might just be enough for them to think there’s a bit of a pattern here. We wrote to Paul Winter Consulting. The thread is copied below:

Dear Sirs [Paul Winter Consulting]

 Your company name has come up three times from three different sources in connection with an anaerobic digestion venture with Simon Whittley-Ryan.

We represent a group of investors who have been defrauded by Mr Whittley-Ryan and we will be publishing an article this week on his anaerobic digestion venture. Your company will be mentioned as being involved in the venture.

We would like to give you an opportunity to explain your relationship with Mr Whittley-Ryan prior to publication and also your involvement, or not, in the proposed fundraising bond. You will be aware Mr Whittley-Ryan has established several bond and preference share investments which all defaulted on payments to investors and subsequently collapsed, leaving investors with significant losses.

We are told that you are also aware that Mr Whittley-Ryan has three companies in liquidation, with a fourth currently subject to winding up proceedings, and is under investigation for his conduct in those companies. 

 

Dear Sirs [SOS]

Thank you for your email.

PWCL is a project management company that provides professional advice to a range of clients, such as developers, landowners or investors on the feasibility of construction projects in the renewable energy sectors. We are not involved in the raising of finance.

Thank you

 

Dear Sirs [Paul Winter Consulting]

OK, we will include that quote in our article.

We will also note that you chose not to comment on your relationship with Simon Whittley-Ryan.  In that respect we will just include the views of other parties who have commented on your relationship.

Regards,

 

Dear Sirs [SOS]

Since it is not our position to comment on dealings with other companies we expect the same of others. We are an independent company and not involved with the intimate dealings of others as you have set out. Therefore if you print anything that is in anyway detrimental to our operations then we will take action. Please make your sources aware that we will report this to the appropriate authorities.

The end result is that Paul Winter Consulting has neither confirmed nor denied its involvement with Simon Whittley-Ryan, but it is hardly a secret as their relationship is common knowledge with the landowners who are being approached.

Folium Energy Ltd (incorporated just three months ago) is described at Companies House as being involved in the “Manufacture of Gas”.  That, along with the fact that the company is involved in anaerobic digestion plants, would appear to be ideally suited to Mr Whittley-Ryan’s particular skillset.  Anaerobic digestion plants require an endless supply of bulls**t which Mr Whittley-Ryan is more than capable of providing.

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