Grand View Private Trust Company and another (Respondents) v Wen-Young Wong and others (Appellants) (Bermuda)
Case ID: JCPC 2020/0064
Jurisdiction: Court of Appeal for Bermuda
Case summary
Issue
Was the removal of all of the members of a family from a Bermudan trust as objects, whilst simultaneously adding a purpose trust as an object to the same trust by its trustee, beyond the scope of the trustee’s powers, not an exercise of those powers for a proper purpose, or otherwise invalid?
Facts
The Global Resource Trust No 1 (the “GRT”) is a Bermudan irrevocable discretionary trust with a trust period of 100 years created for the benefit of the children and remoter issue of YC Wang and YT Wang living on or born after 10 May 2001. The GRT was declared on 10 May 2001 and is estimated to hold assets of over US$500m as of 2019. The Wang Family Trust (the “WFT”) is a Bermudan perpetual purpose trust for a mixture of noncharitable and charitable purposes and has no human objects. It was declared by the first respondent, Grand View Private Trust Company (“Grand View”) on 10 May 2001 and was transferred assets worth around US$567m at the time of its creation. Winston Wong, Riley Wong, Jennifer Wang and Tony Wang were all objects of the GRT at the time of its creation and contend on this appeal that they still are.
In May 2005, the directors of the GRT trustee determined that the GRT trustee would (i) transfer the assets of the GRT to Grand View (of which they were also directors) as trustee for the WFT, (ii) add Grand View as an object of the GRT, and (iii) exclude all of the existing objects of the GRT (including the appellants). The directors of the GRT trustee took steps to execute those decisions in September 2005. The GRT Trustee was placed into voluntary liquidation on 29 November 2006 and dissolved on 30 January 2007. The appellants challenge the validity of the changes to the GRT’s objects and the transfer of its assets to Grand View as trustee for the WFT. The appellants succeeded before the Bermuda Supreme Court but that decision was overturned by the Bermuda Court of Appeal. They appealed to the JCPC.
Parties
Appellant(s)
Wen-Young Wong and others
Respondent(s)
Grand View Private Trust Company Ltd
Appeal
Justices
Lord Hodge, Lord Sales, Lord Burrows, Lady Rose, Lord Richards
Hearing start date
8 March 2022
Hearing finish date
10 March 2022
| Watch hearing | ||
|---|---|---|
| 8 March 2022 | Morning session | Afternoon session |
| 9 March 2022 | Morning session | Afternoon session |
| 10 March 2022 | Morning session | |
Judgment details
Judgment date
8 December 2022
Neutral citation
[2022] UKPC 47