A landmark multimillion-pound divorce battle could be engaged before the Supreme Court for a second time after an oil trader was told to pay £360,200 in maintenance to his ex-wife or face prison.

Michael Prest lost the latest round in a long-running dispute last week in the Court of Appeal. He now faces being committed to prison for four weeks if he does not pay maintenance to Yasmin Prest (pictured) within three months.

Prest was found to be worth £37.5m by the High Court in 2011, but he claimed that since then his oil-trading business had collapsed. He asked the appeal court to intervene after the High Court found in July 2014 that he had wilfully defaulted on a maintenance order.

The dispute could be set to continue, however, despite the failure of this latest challenge. Collyer Bristow, the firm representing Michael Prest, said the case will progress to the Supreme Court if permission is given to appeal.

If the appeal is successful the case will come before the Supreme Court for the second time. In 2013, the court ruled that Yasmin Prest was entitled to receive millions of pounds of property assets in her settlement in a ruling which set a precedent on hiding assets in divorce cases.