In this issue

Issue 20  February 2022

In this issue

Issue 63 • January 2021

Welcome to Leasing Life’s quarterly e-magazine for asset finance and leasing professionals in the UK and Continental Europe.

We start the year with the sobering UK story of asset finance gone wrong, as the details of the Arena Television scandal start to emerge.

Arena TV was considered one of the UK’s best established outsider broadcasters, with a solid client base and a top-notch credit score. The company which had been operating for over 30 years collapsed suddenly towards the end of last year, leaving in its wake no less than 55 UK lenders who collectively issued the broadcaster with £280m via leasing facilities.

It appears that much of the security on which the lending was based simply did not exist, leading some observers to describe it as one of the biggest asset-based lending frauds in recent UK memory.

Administrators Kroll, in their report to Arena’s creditors, said “thousands” of items of broadcasting equipment were simply invented, and Arena’s two directors appear to have absconded, thought to have left the country, with the courts discussing where to serve them papers.

Unsecured creditors know the extent of the damage but what remains to discover is exactly how the how the wool was pulled over their eyes, for how long and how many third parties were involved.

For that reason, our top feature is about fraud prevention in the UK and the talk at the moment is about the merits (or otherwise) of a long-called-for ‘asset register’ and more recently a ‘borrowing register.

We also have stories in this edition about Russian leasing as tensions rise over conflict with the Ukraine, Dutch banks and deforestation and French leasing during 2021.

Alejandro Gonzalez, editor