Comet's former owner OpCapita recoups £54m from collapse

Administrator Deloitte filed an update on the process on Companies House that revealed Hailey Acquisitions Limited, the vehicle OpCapita and its backers used to buy Comet, could be in line for further payments from the demise of the business.

An additional £29m is yet to be distributed. Hailey Acquisitions also controls Comet’s profitable warranty business, Triptych, and is in talks to buy up to £27m of the retailer’s taxable losses, which it could use to offset other tax payments, according to The Telegraph.

However, Comet’s unsecured creditors, who are owed £232m, will get less than 1p in the pound.

Comet collapsed in November last year, just nine months after private investment firm OpCapita bought the business for £2 in February 2012 from Kesa Electricals.

The £140m of debts that Hailey Acquisitions is listed as having by administrators is thought to include a £30m asset-backed loan that was bought by the firm and lent to Comet, as well as £110m of existing debt that was acquired when Kesa sold the retailer.

Deloitte told the newspaper it instructed independent legal adviser Mayer Brown to review the security held by Hailey Acquisitions over Comet’s assets and found it to be “valid”.