Ambrosione v Peretie [2026] EWHC 1332 (Comm)

Stephen Hackett (instructed by Candey) for the Claimant

Introduction

• The Defendant seeks, by application dated 13 April 2026, to vary my order dated 9 March 2026 requiring him to pay £250,000 into court as a condition of continuing his defence to the claim (the “Conditional Order“).

• By this claim, the Claimant seeks to enforce an alleged personal guarantee against the Defendant. The guarantee was for £700,000 and with interest the total sums claimed are over £1 million. The Claimant applied for summary judgment. I rejected that application by (judgment dated 3 February 2026), but subsequently considered written submissions and evidence from the parties as to whether the Defendant should pay a sum of money into court or satisfy some other requirement as a condition for continuing to defend the claim.

• The submissions and evidence were supplied as follows:

i) The Claimant provided written submissions on 6 February 2026 in support of his position that there should be a conditional order. Paragraph 13 of those submissions cited the decision in Gama Aviation (UK) v Taverelas Petroleum Trading DMCC [2019] EWCA Civ 119, including the principles that the burden is on the defendant to establish on the balance of probabilities that it would be unable to comply with a condition requiring payment into court, and that in order to discharge that burden a defendant must show, not only that it does not itself have the necessary funds, but that no such funds would be made available to it by a third party.

ii) I had originally ordered the Defendant to reply by 12 February 2026. However, on 11 February 2026 I received a letter from Keystone Law, then acting for the Defendant, seeking an extension of time of a week. The letter said that Keystone Law had been unable to take instructions from the Defendant because he had been pre-occupied with personal matter, and sought an extension of one week, which I granted.

iii) The Defendant put in responsive submissions signed by counsel, together with the Defendant’s second witness statement and exhibit on 19 February 2026.

iv) On 25 February 2026 the Claimant put in written submissions in reply together with the first witness statement of Mr Dunn.

• Having considered the evidence and submissions on the papers, by a written ruling dated 9 March 2026, I decided that Defendant should pay £250,000 into Court as a condition of continuing to defend the claim ([2026] EWHC 465 (Comm): the “Ruling”). I determined that this was an appropriate case to require a payment in because the Defendant’s prospects of success were real but nevertheless improbable and (relevantly for present purposes), I did not consider that the Defendant had discharged the burden that he was unable to make (or cause to be made) a payment into court (see paragraphs 16-19 of the Ruling).

• In further email exchanges with the court, the Claimant submitted that the Ruling should lead to an unless order. This was reflected in the Conditional Order which provided that the summary judgment application would be dismissed if the Defendant paid £250,000 into court by 4pm on 13 April 2026 (para 2), but that if this condition was not met within the time allowed, summary judgment would be entered for the Claimant (para 3).

• There was no appeal from the Conditional Order, but instead the Defendant made the present application on 13 April 2026 to vary paragraph 2 of the Conditional Order to replace the amount of £250,000 with £1,000. The E-filing submission confirmation showed that the application had been lodged at court at 4.03PM on 13 April 2026.

• At the time of making the application to vary, the Defendant was still represented by Keystone Law. The application was supported by his third witness statement and exhibit, together with an application notice and draft order.

• The Claimant put in evidence in reply (second witness statement of Mr Dunn dated 24 April 2026), and the Defendant responded with his fourth statement dated 8 May 2026. By this time he no longer retained Keystone law but was representing himself.

• The hearing took place remotely on 14 May 2026. The Claimant was represented by counsel and the Defendant represented himself with the assistance of a McKenzie friend.

Continue reading this Judgment here.