The holidays came early for the United States Trustee (the “U.S. Trustee”) on November, 3, 2020, when a three-judge panel of the United States Circuit Court for the Fifth Circuit, on direct appeal, reversed the bankruptcy court and upheld the constitutionality of a 2017 increase to quarterly fees payable to the U.S. Trustee in Hobbs v. Buffets LLC (In re Buffets LLC), No. 19-50765, 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 34866 (5th Cir. Nov. 3, 2020). Although the Fifth Circuit’s opinion addresses a variety of constitutional challenges to the recent increase to U.S.
The Supreme Court, in Ritzen Group, Inc. v. Jackson Masonry, LLC,1 issued an unanimous opinion last week, ruling that the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit correctly denied the ability of creditor Ritzen Group Inc.
All too often the task of procuring and renewing D&O insurance at a portfolio company is assigned to the portfolio company’s CFO or Controller, who employs an insurance broker to find the best price for the amount of coverage deemed appropriate by the broker. When such insurance is procured and thereafter renewed, the CFO/Controller simply reports to the board the fact of the procurement/renewal and few questions about the terms of coverage are discussed at the board level. This can be a big mistake.
In the novel A Frolic of His Own, by William Gaddis1, the protagonist, Oscar Crease, is run over by his own driverless car when it slips from park into neutral while Oscar is standing in front of the car trying to hot-wire it.
Background: Professionals’ Fees in Chapter 11 cases
Major legislative changes
Reform of English corporate insolvency framework
The Insolvency Service is reviewing responses to its consultation on significant reforms designed to improve the restructuring tools available to companies. These include:
Recently, a bankruptcy court in the First Circuit, confronted with whether the debtors’ chapter 12 case could be converted to a chapter 11 case – an issue over which there is split in the case law – determined that the Debtors’ chapter 12 case could not be converted to a chapter 11 case.
Relevant Statutes and Statutory Provisions:
By now (unless you’ve been living under a rock), we’re all familiar with the expression, “Netflix and chill.” It’s everywhere. Flooding your Instagram feed with duplicitous memes. Halloween costumes. Really, really bad pick-up lines. Like the many trite colloquialisms that have come before it, Netflix and chill’s ubiquity has begun to wane with overuse and time.
Early this week, a California Bankruptcy Court schooled counsel on abiding by local rules, avoiding gamesmanship, and maintaining a level of civility in litigation proceedings. These lessons arose in the context of an adversary proceeding in which counsel filed an emergency motion for a continuance of the deadline to respond to a complaint following retention of new counsel.
Lesson #1: Check for Typos
Funds passing through a correspondent bank account in New York can create personal jurisdiction over the funds’ recipient, ruled the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. In Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors of Arcapita Bank B.S.C. v.