Canada

The wave of bankruptcies that swept across the country during the recession has seen the government’s unclaimed bankruptcy account leap by about 45% as the feds seized money and assets belonging to insolvent consumers, the Toronto Sun reported. In March 2007, before the global credit crunch started shocking banks around the world, the feds held $9.375 million in their unclaimed bankruptcy fund account. By May 5 of this year that balance had jumped to $13.6 million.

AbitibiBowater Inc., the Canadian paper company that sought bankruptcy protection last year to restructure its crushing debt load, won approval to keep sole control of its Chapter 11 case for another two months, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. Judge Kevin J. Carey of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Del., approved the Montreal-based pulp and paper manufacturer's request for an extension through July 21 of its sole right to file a plan to exit bankruptcy.

Patients will continue to receive their publicly funded knee and hip replacement surgeries at a private medical facility in Calgary until January, but it will come at an additional cost to taxpayers, The Vancouver Sun reported. Alberta Health Services filed an application in Court of Queen's earlier this month in a bid to ward off bankruptcy proceedings caused by a legal dispute between Networc Health — which owns the Health Resource Centre — and one of its creditors, Cambrian Group of Companies.

In the end, the billion-dollar auction of Canada’s largest newspaper chain wasn’t even close. Torstar Corp. and its deep-pocketed financial backer, Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd. -- once thought to be the favourites to buy the 46 papers that made up the CanWest Global Communications Corp. media empire -- instead placed a distant second in the bidding, The Globe and Mail reported. The winning offer this week came from a group of unsecured creditors who trumped Torstar and Fairfax’s $800-million offer by $300-million. The $1.1-billion bid came from a consortium that includes U.S.

Transurban Group said Monday that its Canadian pension fund shareholders are considering whether or not to lodge a revised takeover bid for Lane Cove Tunnel after it agreed to pay 630.5 million Australian dollars (US$569.4 million) for the tollroad operator, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Workers at newsprint maker AbitibiBowater have ratified a new collective agreement that includes cost reductions for the company, but protects pensions for retirees and workers, Reuters reported. The Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada (CEP) said on Monday that the new agreement will remain effective until 2014. AbitibiBowater, headquartered in Montreal but incorporated in the United States, filed for bankruptcy protection in April 2009 after crumpling under a heavy debt load. Last week, the company filed what it called a "framework" for a plan of reorganization.

Paul Godfrey, a veteran media executive with a salesman’s touch, has been given the biggest turnaround assignment of his business career: taking charge of Canada’s largest newspaper chain after a group of investors won the bidding for it, The Globe and Mail reported. The 46 publications, including the National Post, once formed a major piece of the now-crumbling CanWest Global Communications Corp. media empire and were sold Monday to unsecured lenders for $1.1-billion. The deal wraps up an auction process that began when the newspaper unit filed for creditor protection in January.

The financially-troubled surgical clinic at the centre of a bankruptcy battle says Alberta Health Services abruptly pulled back from an agreement promising it nearly triple the number of surgeries usually provided, according to court documents, The Calgary Herald reported.

When big investors saw Greece falling into deep financial trouble this year, some of them turned to a familiar ally to profit from the nation's fiscal crunch: the credit default swap, The Globe and Mail reported. The swaps, often called CDS for short, are financial instruments that allow investors to place money on the risk that a company or country won't be able to pay its debts. Nowadays, they can place such bet against nearly every country, from economic powerhouses like Germany and the U.S. to those of marginal economic significance, such as El Salvador and Guatemala.

Canadian pulp-and-paper company AbitibiBowater Inc. has filed a Chapter 11 plan of reorganization that proposes to pay its secured debt in full and would hand equity to its unsecured creditors, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. In a press release, AbitibiBowater said it filed the plan Tuesday with both the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Del., and the Quebec Superior Court in Canada, where the company's U.S. and Canadian units have each sought protection from their creditors.