Companies Act, 1990

Civil liability for unlawful dealing.

109.—(1) Where a person deals in or causes or procures another person to deal in securities in a manner declared unlawful by section 108 or communicates information in any such manner, that person shall, without prejudice to any other cause of action which may lie against him, be liable—

(a) to compensate any other party to the transaction who was not in possession of the relevant information for any loss sustained by that party by reason of any difference between the price at which the securities were dealt in in that transaction and the price at which they would have been likely to have been dealt in in such a transaction at the time when the first-mentioned transaction took place if that information had been generally available; and

(b) to account to the company that issued or made available those securities for any profit accruing to the first-mentioned person from dealing in those securities.

(2) The amount of compensation for which a person is liable under subsection (1) or the amount of the profit for which a person is liable to account under that subsection is—

(a) subject to paragraph (b), the amount of the loss sustained by the person claiming the compensation or the amount of the profit referred to in subsection (1) (b), as the case may be; or

(b) if the person so liable has been found by a court to be liable to pay an amount or amounts to any other person or persons by reason of the same act or transaction, the amount of that loss or profit less the amount or the sum of the amounts for which that person has been found to be liable.

(3) For the purposes of subsection (2), the onus of proving that the liability of a person to pay an amount to another person arose from the same act or transaction from which another liability arose lies on the person liable to pay the amount.

(4) An action under this section for recovery of a loss or profit shall not be commenced after the expiration of 2 years after the date of completion of the transaction in which the loss or profit occurred.