• Ex-BHS owner Dominic Chappell battles to retain control of Retail Acquisitions
  • Administrators want to seize the business to investigate loans it took from BHS
  • Comes as Mike Sherwood, who advised Sir Philip Green over the sale, quits banking giant Goldman Sachs

Former BHS owner Dominic Chappell is fighting a bid to put his Retail Acquisitions business into administration.

The three times bankrupt, who fronted the consortium that acquired BHS from Sir Philip Green in March last year, is battling to prevent the business from being seized by the failed department store chain’s administrators Duff & Phelps.

Chappell has claimed that he has met a deadline of November 18 to submit evidence to Duff & Phelps’ lawyer, DLA Piper, in a bid to retain control of Retail Acquisitions.

Duff & Phelps wants to put the vehicle into administration so that it can investigate the money lent to the company by BHS.

It is understood that Retail Acquisitions borrowed £8.4m from the retailer.

Chappell has already insisted that £2.4m of that loan has been paid back and told the London Evening Standard that he has given evidence “strongly denying any callable debts” from Retail Acquisitions.

BHS tumbled into administration in April, just 13 months after Chappell’s consortium acquired the business for a nominal £1.

One of the men who advised Green over the sale of BHS, Goldman Sachs banker Mike Sherwood, last night revealed he was quitting the investment banking giant.

Sherwood, who was forced to give evidence to MPs as part of the parliamentary inquiry into BHS’s collapse, oversaw the bank’s growth in Europe as vice-chairman and co-chief executive of Goldman Sachs International, its London-based arm.

He had been tipped as a potential successor to Goldman chief executive Lloyd Blankfein before his involvement in the BHS scandal.

Sherwood denied his departure was related to the controversy surrounding the collapsed high street chain, but admitted: “I wish we hadn’t been involved.”

Speaking to the Financial Times, Sherwood added: “It is one blip in a 30-year career and it really played no part in my decision.”

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