CL-2018-000297, CL-2018-000404, CL-2018-000590, - [2025] EWHC 2364 (Comm)

At the time, Mr Shah was well aware of the form and content of the SCP CANs and, in the latter part of the chronology, those of the other Solo Model custodians, Old Park Lane, Telesto and West Point. He also understood at the time that their only purpose was to support a tax refund claim submitted by one of the Tax Agents on behalf of the USPFs (and, latterly, LabCos) to which they were issued; and that the CANs themselves had to be submitted to SKAT, and were routinely so submitted, as the ‘dividend advice(s)’ required by Form 06.003, a form with which he was familiar. I did not identify any basis for a finding, nor did SKAT seek a finding, that Mr Shah was aware of Form 06.008 or of the fact that Form 06.003, the then current form, was not used in every instance.

Mr Shah cavilled in cross-examination at the suggestion that he knew at the time that the CANs went to SKAT. However, I do not think it credible that he does not now still know that he knew at the time that the CANs themselves went to SKAT, so obvious is it on the documentary evidence that he did and so central to everything were the CANs. Indeed, I think that SKAT was correct to submit in closing, as it did, that Mr Shah gave himself away on that point by an unguarded answer when trying to defend a silly point he had put forward that SKAT had somehow ‘approved’ the Solo Model trading structure by paying tax reclaims arising from it:

“Q. … You say they in inverted commas somehow “approved” this by paying. How do you say SKAT would have known or knew that these were cum-ex trades, Mr Shah?

…

A. They wouldn’t have known that they were cum-ex trades, but they would have known that the DCAs were genuine.

Q. They would have known -- they would certainly have thought that the DCAs were genuine, Mr Shah.

A. Thought, yes. But my belief was that they knew the DCAs were genuine.”

Mr Shah saw examples of Acupay’s covering letter in connection with the first Solo Model Danish trades. Acupay sent Solo, and I think it overwhelmingly likely Mr Shah would have read at the time, copies of the full tax refund claim documentation submitted to SKAT for their first five Solo Model Danish tax reclaims. He did not see Goal or Syntax cover letters. If representations were made to SKAT only because of the language used in those cover letters, then Mr Shah was unaware of them.