{"id":98061,"date":"2026-08-05T19:37:34","date_gmt":"2026-08-05T19:37:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/98061\/"},"modified":"2026-08-05T19:37:34","modified_gmt":"2026-08-05T19:37:34","slug":"barclays-in-legal-battle-with-mfs-administrators-over-frozen-bank-accounts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/98061\/","title":{"rendered":"Barclays in legal battle with MFS administrators over frozen bank accounts"},"content":{"rendered":"<p data-speakable=\"summary\">Latest update adds fresh pressure amid FCA scrutiny and accusations of double pledging<\/p>\n<p class=\"my-1\">It has been widely reported that AlixPartners, which was appointed as joint administrators for MFS in February, filed a High Court claim against Barclays on Friday 31st July, to reclaim funds from the failed lender.<\/p>\n<p class=\"my-1\">Barclays was known to have high levels of exposure to MFS, although the bank\u2019s group chief executive <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" class=\"text-blue-600 underline cursor-pointer hover:text-blue-800\" href=\"https:\/\/bridgingandcommercial.co.uk\/inside-the-13bn-mfs-black-hole-how-a-bridging-giant-unravelled\">C.S. Venkatakrishnan said its exposure to MFS was \u201cmaterially lower\u201d than the \u00a3500m that has been reported<\/a> and was a number that was \u201cnot the kind that would have been material enough for us to report on an inter-quarter basis.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"my-1\">MFS entered administration in February, <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" class=\"text-blue-600 underline cursor-pointer hover:text-blue-800\" href=\"https:\/\/bridgingandcommercial.co.uk\/bdla-issues-statement-on-market-financial-solutions-entering-administration-22208\">shocking the specialist finance sector<\/a> and leading to the <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" class=\"text-blue-600 underline cursor-pointer hover:text-blue-800\" href=\"https:\/\/bridgingandcommercial.co.uk\/fca-launches-investigation-into-market-financial-solutions-22303\">FCA launching an investigation into the lender<\/a> as part of its Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing and Transfer of Funds (Information on the Payer) Regulations 2017.<\/p>\n<p class=\"my-1\">Despite the business originally claiming an \u201cunexpected banking issue\u201d was to blame for the collapse, court documents later suggested allegations of double pledging, where the same properties were used repeatedly as security for multiple loans.<\/p>\n<p class=\"my-1\">Court filings, seen by B&amp;C, revealed that MFS\u2019 accounts had been <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" class=\"text-blue-600 underline cursor-pointer hover:text-blue-800\" href=\"https:\/\/bridgingandcommercial.co.uk\/inside-the-13bn-mfs-black-hole-how-a-bridging-giant-unravelled\">frozen by Barclays in November 2025<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"my-1\">Former CEO Paresh Raja is believed to be in Dubai, where a spokesperson said he has been a resident for the past five years and it is reported there is an asset freezing order imposed on him.<\/p>\n<p class=\"my-1\">Kirkland &amp; Ellis, which is representing the administrators to MFS, and AlixPartners declined to comment on the latest court filing.<\/p>\n<p class=\"my-1\">B&amp;C has contacted Barclays for comment.<\/p>\n<p>Keywords: Market Financial Solutions, MFS, Barclays, AlixPartners, Paresh Raja, C.S. Venkatakrishnan, bridging finance, bridging lender, High Court claim, frozen bank accounts, FCA investigation, double pledging<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Latest update adds fresh pressure amid FCA scrutiny and accusations of double pledging It has been widely reported&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":98062,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[21264],"tags":[41421,3343,28353,41424,41423,41426,41425,21879,32397,41422],"class_list":["post-98061","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-barclays","tag-alixpartners","tag-barclays","tag-bridging-finance","tag-bridging-lender","tag-c-s-venkatakrishnan","tag-frozen-bank-accounts","tag-high-court-claim","tag-market-financial-solutions","tag-mfs","tag-paresh-raja"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@UnitedKingdom\/117044592128237048","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98061","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=98061"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98061\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/98062"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=98061"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=98061"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=98061"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}