Dan Preddy

Dan is a commercial litigator with extensive experience of helping clients in a variety of sectors to resolve disputes by litigation, arbitration and mediation. He has been involved in a broad range of complex high-value disputes both in the UK and internationally, frequently with a regulatory dimension to them, and has also obtained urgent injunctive relief for clients. He prides himself on working closely with his clients to achieve the best possible outcome from challenging situations. 

He specialises in particular in financial services and insurance disputes including regulatory investigations and enforcement proceedings. He is a leading expert on claims relating to financial advice and product mis-selling advising IFAs, fund and wealth managers, networks and platforms, banks, product providers and insurers on responding to customer complaints, past business reviews, referrals to the Financial Ombudsman Service, court proceedings and recovery claims by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme. He regularly advises firms and individuals on responding to stressful FCA interventions such as unannounced visits, document requests, interviews and skilled person reports. 

Also, Dan frequently defends claims and connected disciplinary proceedings against a variety of professionals, including financial advisers and accountants and their professional indemnity insurers, and also has expertise on the coverage issues that arise in that context. 

His recent work includes:

• Involvement in claims in relation to all the recent mis-selling problems including pension transfers and liberation, Arch Cru, UCIS, property funds including Harlequin, carbon credit schemes, split capital investment trusts, geared traded endowments, PPI, sub-prime mortgages and interest-rate swaps;
• Acting for multiple IFAs and their professional indemnity insurers in claims valued at £12 million brought by the FSCS in respect of Keydata products;
• Acting for Ageas in its successful defence of a claim by the Phoenix Group over whether liability for historic PPI mis-selling liabilities transferred as part of a Part VII insurance transfer scheme (PA(GI) Ltd v GICL 2013 Ltd & Anor) and associated FOS complaints;
• Defending a leading wealth management business against numerous claims by multiple investors totalling in excess of £20 million concerning advice to invest in film finance and other tax avoidance schemes;
• Advising a leading investment bank on its response to the FCA's thematic review into the suitability of advice within the wealth management sector;
• Advising a client on regulatory and criminal investigations by authorities in the UK, US and other jurisdictions relating to alleged LIBOR manipulation, and helping a senior officer of a SIPP administrator to avoid formal enforcement proceedings concerning alleged malpractices;
• Acting for Moore Stephens (NI) on its response to disciplinary proceedings by the FRC relating to its audit of the accounts of the Presbyterian Mutual Society in the years prior to its collapse during the credit crisis;
• Acting for a major multi-national industrial goods business on a large breach of warranty claim arising from its acquisition of a business in the UK, including related product liability issues in multiple jurisdictions;
• A wide range of commercial disputes arising in relation to restrictive covenants, distribution agreements and outsourcing arrangements.

Endorsements  

"Dan Preddy is well regarded as a "really good-quality operator" with significant litigation experience. He handles cross-border disputes and is particularly active in the financial services and insurance fields." Chambers and Partners UK 2016 Edition, Litigation, South West

"Dan Preddy led on a number of high-profile financial services instructions, is "commercial", and "keeps the costs in proportion to the value of the litigation"." Legal 500 2016 Edition, Dispute Resolution, South West