The Hon Sir Richard Field

Richard Field is an arbitrator accepting appointments in a wide range of commercial arbitrations, both domestic and international.  He was called to the Bar in 1977 and appointed QC in 1987.  He was a High Court judge sitting in the Commercial Court from 2002 to September 2014.  In the years 2008 – 2012 he was a Presiding Judge on the Western Circuit and was appointed Judge In Charge of the Commercial Court in January 2014.

During his 25 years at the Bar, he had a broadly based leading commercial practice. He acted for Guinness plc in the multi-litigation fallout from the Distillers takeover (Guinness plc v Saunders [1990] 2AC 663) and acted as junior counsel for the multi-brokers in the Tin Council litigation (Maclaine Watson & Co v ITC [1990] 2AC 418). He also acted for Coopers & Lybrand (Singapore) following the collapse of Barings Bank and appeared in Hong Kong for the Liquidators of the Carrion Group in a multi-million dollar auditors negligence claim. In addition, he advised on and appeared in a number of important competition cases (eg Courage Ltd v Crehan [2001] EWCA Civ 1930) and was counsel in the leading case on transferable letters of credit (Bank Negara Indonesia v Lariza Singapore Pte Ltd [1988] 1AC 583 (PC).

As a Commercial Court Judge he decided cases covering the full range of disputes that come before that Court. He also dealt with many arbitration applications, e.g. Latvian Shipping Co v ROSNO [2012] EWHC 1412 (Comm) (shipping); Aloi Nissey Dowa Insurance Co v Heraldgen Ltd [2013] EWHC 154 (Comm) (insurance); Cruz City 1 Mauritius Holdings v Unitech Ltd [2013] EWHC 1323 (Comm) (enforcement); Brockton Capital LLP v Atlantic Pacific Inc [2014] EWHC 1459 (Comm) (real estate placement agreement).

Richard is on the HKIAC panel of arbitrators. His recent arbitrations include a dispute between a Chinese telecommunications manufacturer and a South American mobile phone network and a US$57.8 million claim against a Chinese State Corporation in respect of an iron ore project.

His areas of expertise include insurance, banking, derivatives, international commodity sales, sales of ships, forex trading, CFD trading, carriage of goods, shipbuilding contracts, maritime disputes, international projects (including natural resources), joint venture agreements and shareholder agreements.

He sits part time as a Justice of the Dubai DIFC Court and as a Justice of Appeal in the Cayman Islands Court of Appeal.

Richard was Tung Yu Cheng Visiting Professor in the Faculty of Law at Hong Kong University 2014 -2015.