Creditors are searching for Syrian property tycoon Simon Halabi after he was declared bankrupt in a London court.
Halabi, who built a huge empire in London offices and owned the Esporta gym chain, is one of the richest entrepreneurs at the peak of the boom to fall victim to the global recession, reported the Times.
His portfolio included the London headquarters of JP Morgan, Aviva, RSA and Old Mutual, as well as the In and Out Club on London’s Piccadilly and Mentmore Towers, the former home of Baron Mayer de Rothschild.
However, Halabi failed to attend a High Court hearing last week at which he was declared bankrupt over a $85.6m loan that he received from Kaupthing Singer & Friedlander, the failed Icelandic bank.
The loan was to help to buy Esporta in 2007, the newspaper said.
Once valued at $2.7bn, Halabi’s White Tower properties are now expected to fetch no more than $1.5bn through a sale forced by a breach of its loan-to-value covenant, the newspaper said.
According to the Times, Laura John, barrister for Ernst & Young, Kaupthing’s administrator, told the High Court that Halabi had not responded to a bankruptcy petition served to Ashurst, the law firm previously used by Halabi.
John said that her clients were “not entirely sure” where Halabi was, although his address had been given as a hotel in Switzerland. According to the newspaper, a spokeswoman for Ernst & Young declined to comment.
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