EMI tycoon faces investor scrutiny

PRIVATE equity tycoon Guy Hands faces tough demands on how he spends investors’ cash after his disastrous takeover of EMI.

Terra Firma lost around £2bn when it bought the record company at the start of the financial crisis.

Hands, the private equity group’s founder, then attempted to sue his banker Citigroup for £1.5bn over claims he was misled, but dropped the lawsuit last year because he could no longer remember some technical details of what happened.

The 57-year-old Oxford-educated art and wine buff is now asking investors for £2.7bn for a new flagship fund. He is said to have secured support from several institutions – but only on condition no more than 15pc is invested in one business, and the cash is not put into multiple funds.

Described by one investor as ‘ an acquired taste, like marmite,’ Hands moved from Kent to Guernsey in 2009 to avoid tax. The following year, he claimed not to have set foot in the UK since leaving.