Quadra Commodities SA & Ors v International Bank of St-Petersburg (Joint-Stock Company) (Rev 1)

Costs must be assessed in the round, having regard to reasonableness and proportionality. High rates, excessive staffing and unnecessary documentary work may justify substantial reductions, even where the hearing was important and the opposing party incurred similar costs.

A reasoned judgment following a private arbitration-related hearing should generally be published where this can occur without disclosing significant confidential information. The court must balance the interests of publicity, including guidance on legal or procedural issues, against arbitration confidentiality. A party seeking to suppress the judgment faces a heavy burden.

The judgment determined consequential matters arising from earlier hearings in arbitration-related proceedings between the claimants and the defendant. It assessed the defendant’s costs of two hearings and considered whether a judgment concerning an undertaking given in connection with an anti-suit injunction should be published.

The central issues were whether the costs claimed were reasonable and proportionate, whether the usual order that the unsuccessful party pay the successful party’s costs should be displaced, and whether publication could occur consistently with the confidentiality associated with the underlying arbitration.

1. Costs of the 22 January hearing. The defendant’s claimed costs were extraordinarily high. The court took account of the hearing’s importance and complexity, but also of the half-day duration, the number of fee earners and counsel attending, high charge-out rates and substantial documentary work. The costs were summarily assessed at £45,000.
2. Costs of the 12 March hearing. The defendant was the successful party because the claimants’ core case concerning the undertaking and proviso failed. The fact that the defendant’s position had been modified in correspondence did not justify departing from the general rule that the unsuccessful party pays the successful party’s costs. Those costs were assessed at £50,000, taking account of work already undertaken for the earlier hearing and the need for proportionality.
3. Publication. The court adopted the principles summarised by HHJ Pelling QC from City of Moscow v Bankers Trust Co [2004] EWCA Civ 314; [2005] QB 207, as discussed in Newcastle United FC Ltd v The Football Association Premier League Ltd and others [2021] EWHC 450 (Comm). A private hearing and the resulting reasoned judgment engage different considerations. Publication is appropriate where confidentiality can be protected by anonymisation or redaction, and is particularly supported where the judgment gives guidance on law or practice or concerns a claim under Arbitration Act 1996, s.68. A party seeking privacy need not prove positive detriment beyond the undermining of its confidentiality expectation, but the interests of publicity must be weighed against the confidentiality of the arbitration, with primary attention to the interests of the parties before the court.
4. Publication of the 12 March judgment was ordered. It disclosed no significant confidential information, and the public interest in the fairness of the Commercial Court’s anti-suit injunction process supported publication.