The UK’s EU Referendum on membership is looming on the horizon – What are the legal implications of a so-called “Brexit” for restructuring and insolvency professionals?

The EU Referendum Act 2015 obtained Royal Assent on 17 December 2015 and provides for the following question to be put forward for voting in a referendum in the UK until the end of 2017: “Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the EU or leave the EU?”

By order of the Commercial Court of Vienna from 30.11.2015, bankruptcy proceedings were opened against the assets of the food chain Zielpunkt GmbH. With liabilities amounting to approximately 237 million euros, the Zielpunkt insolvency is the biggest of 2015. Zielpunkt has 229 branches in total in Austria and employs 2708 employees. The insolvency administrator is trying to sell as many branches as possible. The acquisition of Zielpunkt branches by competitors, as by the two biggest grocers REWE and Spar, however, raises competition law concerns due to the large market share.

As can be read in the media, reorganization proceedings were opened on the assets of the Kärntner Landes- und Hypothekenbank-Holding.

The reason for the application for initiation of reorganization proceedings is the liability by virtue of law of the applicant for all current and future liabilities of the bad bank HETA Asset Resolution AG, universal successor of Hypo Alpe-Adria-Bank International AG. 

Following on from our recent blog on ‘How the UK General Election Might Influence the Recast Insolvency Regulation’ and whether the UK will still be part of the EU in 2017 when it comes into force, we consider the ‘hokey cokey’ of the upcoming EU referendum.

Since 01 January 1995 natural persons in Austria have the possibility of debt relief within the framework of debt settlement proceedings. This is a special form of insolvency proceedings for natural persons, irrespective of whether they are consumers or individual entrepreneurs.  The aim of the debt settlement proceedings is the ability to offer a person who is insolvent the chance to escape from an otherwise often endless cycle of constantly rising debt through accrued interest and new execution costs, and to become debt free after seven years.

The European Advocate General has today given his opinion in the “Woolworths case” (and two other cases) on the meaning of “establishment” for the purposes of determining when the duty to consult appropriate representatives is triggered under the European Collective Redundancies Directive (the Directive).

Since 2000 public notices of documents and decisions in insolvency proceedings must be published in the Internet Insolvency Gazette (the Gazette) and are no longer made available on the court notice board. The Gazette plays a central role in insolvency proceedings in Austria.

Content

The Gazette contains details of insolvency edicts, court decisions on closing and reopening of proceedings for companies as well as on the distribution of available assets. The Gazette is updated Monday to Friday between 23:00 and midnight.

In Europe each year there are an estimated 200,000 corporate insolvencies. More than half of the companies set up do not survive their first five years of trading and more than 1.7 million jobs are lost every year as a result. One in five of those companies will have international operations that cross national borders.

The European Union (EU) has sought to introduce an element of harmonization across its Member States, to facilitate the effective operation of cross-border insolvencies.

Background

The past eighteen months have seen a marked increase in the use of the Company Voluntary Arrangement (“CVA”) by retailers to reduce their lease liabilities and win the release of onerous parent company guarantees, with several high street names going through the process. Although this practice received cautious support from landlords, real concern continues to be voiced over the practice of “guarantee stripping”.