For a vast number of professionals, email has become the preferred method for communicating and conducting business. However, many of those people who would choose to fire off a quick email over picking up a phone may not be aware that a casual email can transform into a binding, enforceable contract. Such was the case for the parties in Shinhan Bank v. Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. (In re Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.), Case No. 17-2700, 2018 WL 3469004 (2d Cir.
Readers familiar with contract law undoubtedly know the “mailbox rule,” that an offer is accepted the moment a document goes in the mail.1 The United States Bankruptcy Appellate Panel for the Ninth Circuit (the “BAP”) recently dealt with its own variant of the mailbox rule: does the issuance of a check constitute a transfer of estate assets on the date the check is delivered or on the date it is honored?
Here’s an aggregation of 28 of my Twitter posts from mid-June 2018, with links to important cases, articles, and news briefs that restructuring professionals should find of interest. Don’t hesitate to reach out and contact me to discuss any posts, and thank you for reading!
BK RELATED CASES:
Here’s an aggregation of 35 of my Twitter posts from June 16-18, 2018, with links to important cases, articles, and news briefs that restructuring professionals will find of interest. Don’t hesitate to reach out and contact me to discuss any posts, and thank you for reading!
BK RELATED CASES:
A recent Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decision provides insight into “bad faith” claims-buying activity; specifically whether a creditor’s purchase of claims for the express purpose of blocking plan confirmation is permissible. In In re Fagerdala USA-Lompoc, Inc., the Court found it was—the secured creditor did not act in bad faith when it purchased a subset of all general unsecured claims and voted those claims against confirmation because it was acting to further its own economic interest as a creditor, without some extrinsic ulterior motive.
The Bankruptcy Code’s cramdown provisions are a powerful tool for debtors in the plan confirmation process. Pursuant to section 1129(a)(10) of the Bankruptcy Code, a plan may be confirmed if, among other things, “at least one class of claims that is impaired under the plan has accepted the plan.” Once there is an impaired accepting class, and assuming certain requirements are met, the plan may then be “crammed down” on all other classes of impaired creditors that reject the plan and those creditors will be bound by the terms of a plan they rejected.
Weird things happen in bankruptcy court. All you high-falutin Chapter 11 jokers out there, cruise down to the bankruptcy motions calendar one day.
Many practitioners know that certain types of tax debt are not discharged in an individual debtor’s bankruptcy case. But there are classes of tax debt that may be discharged. For example, income tax debt not excepted under Bankruptcy Code section 523(a)(1) may be discharged. One exception in section 523 is for tax debt for which a tax return was not filed or given. This can often come up in an individual bankruptcy case where the debtor has failed to file tax returns before the bankruptcy case. But what happens to the tax debt if the debtor filed the return late?
Under the Bankruptcy Code, a preference payment is commonly defined as a transfer of property of the debtor within 90 days before the bankruptcy filing to or for the benefit of a creditor on account of an existing debt while the debtor was insolvent, allowing the creditor to receive more than it would otherwise receive in a chapter 7 liquidation.