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Section 656: Public companies: duty of directors to call meeting on serious loss of capital

Companies Act 2006 · 2006 c. 46View on legislation.gov.uk

Part 17: A company's share capital — Chapter 11: Miscellaneous and supplementary provisions

Where the net assets of a public company are half or less of its called-up share capital, the directors must call a general meeting of the company to consider whether any, and if so what, steps should be taken to deal with the situation.

They must do so not later than 28 days from the earliest day on which that fact is known to a director of the company.

The meeting must be convened for a date not later than 56 days from that day.

If there is a failure to convene a meeting as required by this section, each of the directors of the company who—

knowingly authorises or permits the failure, or
after the period during which the meeting should have been convened, knowingly authorises or permits the failure to continue,

commits an offence.

A person guilty of an offence under this section is liable—

on conviction on indictment, to a fine;
on summary conviction, to a fine not exceeding the statutory maximum.

Nothing in this section authorises the consideration at a meeting convened in pursuance of subsection (1) of any matter that could not have been considered at that meeting apart from this section.

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This legislation text comes from legislation.gov.uk. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. These source and reuse terms cover the legislation text, not Remedy's commentary.

Reuse reviewed 21 August 2026 under Open Government Licence v3.0.