Matthew Harders

Matthew Harders 

Senior Associate | Cayman

Matthew is a highly skilled commercial litigation attorney with a focus on insolvency, restructuring, and debt recovery. 

Experience

Matthew has substantial experience in all aspects of insolvency, restructuring, financial services and general commercial litigation practice, including complex contractual disputes, shareholder disputes, trusts and trust management, urgent and interlocutory injunctions, winding up and bankruptcy petitions, restructuring and schemes of arrangement, asset recovery, secured and unsecured debt recovery and security enforcement.

Matthew practiced in Australia for more than five years before moving to the Cayman Islands in 2023. Previously a Senior Associate in the Insolvency and Litigation team of Thomson Geer Lawyers, Matthew was the only solicitor within Thomson Geer engaged directly by upper management to recover debts owed to the Firm on a national basis, successfully recovering hundreds of thousands of dollars owed to the Firm, slashing the Firm's Bad Debts liability.

"I pride myself on being highly organised with an acute attention to detail, as well as being outcome driven and focused on the quality of my work."

He joined Collas Crill in October 2024. 

Background

In 2017 Matthew completed a Bachelor of Laws and Legal Practice (with Distinction), a Bachelor of Business (Business Economics) and Bachelor of Letters (Italian) at The Flinders University of South Australia.

Matthew worked as a summer Clerk at Kain Lawyers, a boutique corporate and commercial law firm based in Adelaide, South Australia, before moving to Thomson Geer.

After graduating, Matthew remained engaged with The Flinders University of South Australia as an industry mentor, providing direct one-on-one or small-group mentorship to law students, as well as speaking on various educational and industry panels hosted by the University.

Senior Legal Secretary
Kathleen Gillam  
My services
Dispute resolution
+
-

We live in an increasingly contentious world. When your business is involved in any kind of legal dispute it's crucial to work with lawyers who are hands-on, cost-effective and flexible enough to respond quickly and intuitively to your unique situation and needs.

Read more
Insolvency and restructuring
+
-

Our multi-jurisdictional team brings a wealth of experience from a range of diverse backgrounds to give quick, accurate, commercial advice. We work across dispute resolution, restructuring, recovery and insolvency matters to ensure that clients get the full benefit of our know-how and experience across the world.

Read more
Debt recovery and enforcement
+
-

When customers or clients do not pay on time, we provide timely and effective advice on recovering debts and enforcing judgments. We help businesses, service providers, lenders and borrowers – including banks, funds, directors, and insolvency practitioners – recover commercial debt swiftly and strategically.

Our services cover court proceedings, arrets, saisies, statutory demands, insolvency proceedings, désastre, realisation, dégrèvement, and enforcement of security interests. We conduct thorough security reviews and advise on pre-emptive measures, ensuring prompt, decisive action with discretion to minimise reputational risk.

Fraud and asset tracing
+
-

We are used to working as part of a multi-jurisdictional team, capable of reacting and responding quickly to urgent requests for assistance with locating and freezing assets.

As sophisticated defendants become more adept at dissipating assets, we've been involved in cases that created new law in the Channel Islands in relation to a party's ability to trace assets and recover their losses. With their ability to deal with complex issues, the team deliver clear, commercial advice on the availability and likely success of recovery methods.

Read more
Schemes of arrangement
+
-

We provide expert legal support on both local and cross border amalgamations of regulated and unregulated companies and work closely with our dispute resolution team on local schemes of arrangement.

Corporate disputes
+
-

Our dispute resolution specialists collaborate seamlessly with our corporate advisory and banking teams across jurisdictions to advise multinational corporations, trust companies, banks, funds, insurers, governments and directors.

We provide a global perspective, working closely with our clients to ensure that they are best placed to respond to customer issues, fraud risks, rapidly changing market conditions and regulatory demands.

Read more
Corporate and commercial regulatory
+
-

Regulation and legal risk management are placing increasing burdens on companies and businesses in terms of time, costs and resources, and the consequences of getting this wrong can be severe. We can assist with all regulatory and compliance issues in Jersey, Guernsey, BVI and Cayman.

Additionally we can help with regulator investigations and visits, enforcement and remediation including representation before regulators, tribunals committees and courts. We have an excellent record in defending corporates and their directors and officers in regulatory proceedings.

Read more
Merger appraisal disputes
+
-

Collas Crill’s Cayman Islands appraisal practice is headed by Partner Rocco Cecere, who is recognised as a leading practitioner in the field. Rocco’s team has significant experience in appraisal litigation.

Rocco is a member of the Grand Court’s users committee which drafted the procedural rules governing appraisals matters. The Cayman Islands merger regime is a relatively new and evolving law. Our cross-border team acts on dissenter and company side, from pre-merger stage all the way through to trial and any appeals.

Contentious regulatory
+
-

In regulatory disputes there are often fine lines between the usual wrangling with the regulator and something more serious – by matching our mix of experienced contentious and non-contentious lawyers to the particular problem at hand, we achieve better and more efficient outcomes.

Read more
21 Aug 2025

Jardine Strategic: Privy Council rejects efforts to shut dissenters out, abolishes 138-year old privilege rule with likely impact on Cayman Islands' Torchlight exception

On 24 July 2025, the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council handed down two important decisions. Each decision concerned separate appeals and issues arising from the same matter, Jardine Strategic Ltd v Oasis Investments II Master Fund Ltd & Others,...

Showing 1 of 1 Results