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By Kirstin Ridley
LONDON, June 8 (Reuters) - British buinesswoman Amanda
Staveley's private equity firm told London's High Court on
Monday it had received a "substantially worse" deal than Qatar
when its syndicate invested billions of pounds in Barclays
during the financial crisis in 2008.
Claiming damages of up to 1.5 billion pounds ($1.9 billion)
for alleged deceit, a lawyer for Staveley's PCP Capital Partners
alleged Barclays had reneged on written and oral representations
that PCP's syndicate would get the same terms as Qatar.
The civil case hinges on the terms Barclays offered Qatar
and PCP's syndicate, which included Abu Dhabi investors, for
taking part in a 7.3 billion pound cash call in October 2008
that allowed the British bank to avoid a state bailout.
Barclays has dismissed the case as misconceived. It argues
that an eight-year Serious Fraud Office inquiry into whether
side deals, called advisory service agreements (ASAs), struck
with Qatar in 2008 had been undisclosed fees had culminated in
blanket acquittals.
PCP alleges Barclays paid Qatar 346 million pounds in extra
fees as well as agreeing to a $3 billion loan for the Gulf
nation in November 2008 that at the date of drawdown almost
exactly matched the amount Qatar was investing.
"In fact, the deal that the Qataris got was very
substantially better and PCP's deal very substantially worse,"
lawyer Joe Smouha told the court as he opened the case for PCP.
PCP, whose syndicate invested about 3.25 billion pounds in
Barclays in 2008, was paid 30 million pounds in April 2009 for
its work on the transaction.
The high-profile trial, one of the last legal clashes in
Britain to revolve around the 2008 crisis, is expected to hear
nine weeks of evidence and call former Barclays CEO John Varley
and one-time senior rainmaker Roger Jenkins.
Staveley is due to give evidence later this week.
The case has come to court four months after Jenkins and two
other former Barclays executives were acquitted of fraud in the
criminal case brought by the SFO over two 2008 fundraisings.
Varley was acquitted last year.
The defendants argued that June and October ASAs had been
cleared by senior directors and lawyers and were intended to
open up lucrative business opportunities in the Middle East.
Qatar has said its investment in Barclays created a
strategic partnership and was part of a plan to build a global
financial portfolio and that the ASAs were genuine.
($1 = 0.7890 pounds)
(Reporting by Kirstin Ridley; Editing by David Clarke)
