Jessops investors warned to approve liquidation

Shareholders have to vote on the voluntary liquidation of Jessops plc, which owned the group's 213 stores and website until September last year.

The plc – labouring under a huge debt burden – sold assets to a new company 47 per cent-owned by bank HSBC and 33 per cent-owned by pension trustees, with the remaining 20 per cent held by an employee trust.

A meeting on Thursday is set to wind-up Jessops plc, with shareholders receiving just 9.7p for every 100 shares owned if the liquidation is approved.

"If shareholders do not vote in favour of the proposal there is no guarantee that they will receive anything at all," the company warned.

Whatever the outcome of the vote, the new business, Jessop Group Limited, will continue to trade as before.

HSBC has given the "new" Jessops a 54m loan to pay the debts of the old company but is waiving 34m of this in return for its 47 per cent share in the bank, leaving the new firm with debts of 20m.

Jessops began life in 1935 and briefly reaped the rewards of the boom in digital cameras, but struggled when high street and internet competitors entered the market, forcing a major overhaul of the group in 2007 and a swathe of store closures before September's restructuring.