Claim No: IL-2025-000064 - [2025] EWHC 2545 (Ch)

I agree with Mr Ciumei KC that when approaching all of the disclosure issues in this case, it is important to bear in mind (as I do) three background issues. These are: (1) the nature of the dispute; (2) the proper approach to be taken to deciding on the issues for, and the scope of, disclosure; and (3) the timetable leading up to, and the further time available before, the trial. Paragraph 9 of my directions order provides for search-based extended disclosure to be given by 4:30 pm on 22 October 2025. I must also bear issues of proportionality firmly in mind. However, these considerations must all be weighed in the balance against the need to ensure, so far as is practicable, that the parties are on an equal footing, and can participate fully in the proceedings, with the parties and their witnesses being able to give their best evidence.

The defendant has identified the following as disclosure issue 4:The trading strategy ‘stage’ which each item of the GR Information related to. He says that the claimants should give narrow, search-based disclosure in accordance with Model D. Essentially, Ms Goodman submits thatthe matters pleaded at paragraph 17 of the particulars of claim (and developed further later in that statement of case) are central to the claimants’ case. In particular, that case is predicated on the defendant having had access to “highly confidential financial researchand modelling in the development of trading strategies”, and the “exclusivity of the research and strategies.” If he did not have that access: (1) he cannot have copied material of any particular value to the claimants or their competitors; and (2) he would not be able to ‘replicate’ any valuable trading strategies (which would impact on the injunctive relief to which the claimants would be entitled). Ms Goodman points out that the defendant positively avers that he only had access to the early stages of the development of trading strategies (whether that be ‘stage’ in the general sense, or a ‘stage’ specifically labelled as such by the claimants). The claimants response is to say that there were no formal ‘stages’ in the development process; but the defendant asserts, based upon his experience as an employee of the first claimant, that there was a certain juncture (or stage) at which he was cut off from the development of a trading strategy: the point at which the trading strategy proper was developed. In any event, Ms Goodman emphasises that the claimants cannot simply assert that this is not an issue because they do not recognise any staging: they have not sought any summary determination on this issue, and it accordingly remains live unless the claimants concede the point. Ms Goodman says that the defendant’s lack of access to the valuable later stages of the trading strategy development process is a ‘central issue’ in the case (citing Lombard North Central). Model D disclosure is therefore appropriate.

The claimants object to the inclusion of this issue and say that it should not be an issue for disclosure at all; but if it is, disclosure should be limited in accordance with Model C (disclosure of particular documents or narrow classes of documents). The ‘Development Stages’ described by the defendant at paragraph 20 of his defence is said to be a framework of his own creation, and it is not understood, or agreed to, by the claimants. It is irrelevant. It is no part of the claimants’ case that the confidential information related to a particular ‘development stage’. Attempting to carry out any kind of disclosure search on such a foundation will inevitably lead to confusion and further dispute, which cannot be accommodated in the current timetable. Issue 4 should therefore be omitted.

Ms Goodman expands upon her earlier submissions in her later document. Whilst I did not direct, or allow, further submissions on this issue, it is only fair that I should have regard to them, despite the claimants’ invitation not to do so. It is the defendant who seeks to invite the court to treat this as an issue for disclosure. It is he who bears the burden on this issue. Ignoring Ms Goodman’s further submissions might only lead to an application for permission to appeal if I were to refuse to identify issue 4 as an issue for disclosure, diverting time and resources away from preparations for an expedited trial.

Ms Goodman reminds the court that at the hearing, she submitted that, regardless of whether the claimants agree that the development of a trading strategy had formal ‘stage’ structures (with the labels applied to them by the defendant at paragraph 20 of his defence), as a matter of logic that must be the case. Indeed, the defendant submits that it is an obvious corollary of the ‘comprehensive information security regime’ (which the claimants plead at paragraph 17 of the particulars of claim) that, as a project progresses from the early upstream/raw data stage to something approximating a valuable trading strategy, more stringent security arrangements would have applied (and, in particular, the level of access that employees of the first claimant would have had to the research project/trading strategy in development). In the words of Mr Ferguson (at paragraph 15 of his first affidavit):

The claimants therefore attest, in their own words, to differing "levels of information", with differing applicable security arrangements. The defendant expects to see communications discussing what stage, or juncture, in the trading strategy development process had been reached with respect to the GR Information. The defendant's proposed issue 4 asks for disclosure with respect to ‘stages’ (as a concept), rather than disclosure by reference to the development stages as pleaded at paragraph 20 of the defence. Accordingly the claimants' objections are misplaced: if they consider that the term ‘stages’ was not used by them, it is open to them to suggest alternative wording to explain how they structured the development of a trading strategy. The parties will, moreover, be best placed to propose and refine keyword searches, with words such as ‘level’ (used by Mr Ferguson, as quoted above), ‘process’, ‘development’, ‘phase’, or ‘juncture’, which can all capture communications which demonstrate internal delineation of parts of the trading strategy development process.

I bear firmly in mind Ms Goodman’s submission that the defendant's contention is that he only ever had access to ‘upstream’, low-value information because he was a mere data scientist. To the extent that he boasted to third parties that he had a view of the claimants’ entire trading strategy, or that he could have ‘replicated’ Humber for the benefit of a competitor, he simply could not have done so. In other words, this was mere ‘puff’ (as I sought to characterise it) or ‘hot air’ (as Ms Goodman preferred to describe it). Ms Goodman accepts that this has no bearing on the confidential quality of the information. Rather, it is relevant to the issue of damages and relief, both generally and, in particular as to the temporal and other extent of any injunctive relief.

However, I also bear in mind that the parties have now agreed disclosure issue 6, whereby the claimants are to give disclosure (in accordance with Model C: disclosure of particular documents or narrow classes of documents) of: