A wealthy career woman has successfully challenged a ruling that her former husband should get half of the fortune she built up during their ''short'' marriage.
Energy trader Julie Sharp and IT consultant Robin Sharp were both high earners on salaries of around £100,000 when they met, but during the relationship she also received bonuses totalling £10.5 million over a five-year period.
A family judge ruled in 2015 that the "principled outcome" was that Mr Sharp should receive half of the "matrimonial pot".
He ended up with a total payment of £2.725 million, which represented 50% of the total matrimonial assets of £5.45 million.
That outcome was later challenged by Mrs Sharp at the Court of Appeal.
On Tuesday, three judges in London announced that they had allowed her appeal.
Lord Justice McFarlane, Lord Justice McCombe and Lord Justice David Richards ruled the total award should be £2 million, made up of a property valued at £1.1 million, which is to be transferred to him, plus a lump sum of £900,000.
During a hearing in February the judges were told it was a six-year relationship, and a ''four-year marriage to separation'', and her case was that ''because this was a short marriage he should not get half of the matrimonial pot''.
The couple met in 2007 and married in June 2009.
Their marriage ended in 2014, and they had no children.
By the time they split up, after she discovered he had started a new relationship, the ''matrimonial pot'' stood at £6.9 million.
But, the final pot to which ''the sharing principle'' applied was reduced to £5.45 million after concessions from the husband relating to the value of a property in Gloucestershire bought by his wife before they married, and to Mrs Sharp's £350,000 of ''pre-acquired and unmingled assets''.
In his 2015 ruling, Sir Peter Singer said: ''No sufficient reason has been identified in this case for departing from equality of division.
"The fact that this is in effect a husband's claim against a wife rather than the more conventional claim of a wife against husband emphatically does not call for a discount.''
The appeal judges were told Mrs Sharp, 44, had offered around £1.2 million to ''comfortably'' meet the needs of her ex-husband, 43.
The Sharps, who were described as being of ''relatively modest'' origins, were both earning ''substantial salaries'' when they met.
Mr Sharp had taken voluntary redundancy in October 2012 and was renovating their £2 million Gloucestershire home.
In September or October 2013 they separated when the wife became aware her husband had been ''pursuing a new relationship for some time and the marriage in practical terms came to an end'', the judges heard.
Announcing the court's decision to cut the award, Lord Justice McFarlane said nothing in the judgment "is intended in any manner to unsettle the clear understanding that has been reached ... on the approach that is to be taken in the vast majority of cases".
He added: "The focus of the present appeal, which is very narrow, is upon whether there is a fringe of cases that may lie outside the equal sharing principle."
Lord Justice McFarlane said a House of Lords case in 2001 had "established what has become a principle that the matrimonial assets of a divorcing couple should normally be shared between them on an equal basis".
He added: "The present appeal requires this court to consider whether that is inevitably the case where the marriage has been short, there are no children, the couple have both worked and maintained separate finances, and where one of them has been paid very substantial bonuses during their time together."
The judge said: "In the present case, the husband made no contribution to the source of the wife's bonuses and this is not a case where, save in the final year, the husband is said to have contributed more to the home life or welfare of the family than the wife.
"This case is, therefore, a 'non-business partnership, non-family asset case' where the bulk, indeed effectively all, of the property has been generated by the wife."
Mrs Sharp had "received bonuses way beyond the level of her previous earnings purely as a result of her employment and ... without any contribution, either domestic or business, from her husband."
The judge said "the existence of a basis for departing from a strict application of equal sharing, albeit in a small number of cases" was "established as a matter of law".
There was "no impediment" for the appeal court "now to contemplate a departure from the equal sharing principle in the case of a dual career marriage which was short and where the couple had kept their finances separate".
The appeal judges concluded the Sharp case was one of a "very small number of cases" where a departure from the equal sharing principle was "justified".
Lord Justice McFarlane said that on the facts of the case, Frank Feehan QC, representing Mrs Sharp, "is therefore right that the combination of potentially relevant factors - short marriage, no children, dual incomes and separate finances - is sufficient to justify a departure from the equal sharing principle in order to achieve overall fairness between these parties".
During the February hearing, Mr Feehan said: "It is instinctively unfair that one party who may have generated substantial wealth in a short time who happens to have been married at the time for not very long, and with no children, is nevertheless required to divide that wealth equally following the breakdown of that already short marriage shortly thereafter.''
Jonathan Southgate QC, for Mr Sharp, argued that to ''seek now to introduce litigation inducing distinctions in relation to sharing matrimonial property between marriages of differing lengths and between different types of assets would be a retrograde step''.
It would, he said, 'lead to uncertainty in the law".
Andrew Newbury, a senior family lawyer with Hall Brown Family Law, described the likely impact of the ruling as "considerable".
He said: "Ever since a major ruling in 2000 in how couples should divide assets built up over the course of a marriage, it's generally been accepted that the split should be equal, regardless of how long a marriage might actually have lasted.
"The Court of Appeal's ruling is something of a sea change in how that concept of fairness should best be applied in relation to short marriages in particular."
Neil Russell, family partner at Seddons, commented: "Marriage is still a partnership.
"The fruits of the partnership continue to be shared equally; unless there is good reason to depart from equality.
"As to the reasons, these remain for the courts to decide on a case-by-case basis.
"The litigation casino remains open with the roulette wheel continuing to spin."
Leading divorce lawyer Alex Carruthers, partner at Hughes Fowler Carruthers, said: "This groundbreaking ruling ultimately dictates that marriage is no longer a financial partnership in some circumstances.
"This raises far more questions than it answers.
"It opens the way for countless legal and philosophical arguments.
"There was previously no legal distinction between a 'short' and a 'long' marriage, and therefore no defined point after which wealth generated should be shared.
"The only clarity provided by this judgment is that there is now a further issue for divorcing couples to bicker about, and for lawyers to profit from."