The fate of Eurotunnel is hanging in the balance today as shareholders face a final call to lend their support to the troubled project’s rescue plan.

Investors have until the close of business to back a debt-for-equity swap that would wipe out a large chunk of the Channel Tunnel operator’s £6 billion debt mountain.

A spokesman for the company said that feedback over the weekend had been “broadly positive”, but he said that turn-out from UK shareholders – who account for 150,000 of Eurotunnel’s 600,000 retail investors – historically had been low, making it difficult to gauge the direction of the vote.

Jacques Gounon, Eurotunnel chairman, must have backing from 50 per cent of shareholders for the plan to go ahead. If he fails, the company could go into administration.

Mr Gounon’s rescue package would mean that a new company, Groupe Eurotunnel, takes over Eurotunnel’s assets, which include the right to operate the tunnel until 2086.

Although the concession is profitable, Mr Gounon said that buying the company saddled with its existing debt would be a “crazy risk” that no company would take. A spokesman for Eurotunnel said that operations would continue as normal whatever the outcome.

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