What does the "Wagatha Christie" debacle and the restructuring tool known as a CVA have in common? Answer: ask anyone and they will tell you exactly what "team" they support. Either you are "team CVA" and to you a CVA is a very useful restructuring tool, which allows a company to reorganise its affairs in a comprehensive manner. Alternatively you are "team landlord" and a CVA is just a device which is being used tactically to shaft property stakeholders.

It would appear that the trend we reported in the rising numbers of Scottish corporate insolvencies is showing no let up.

It has taken over 20 months, but we now have a reported decision from the High Court in England on the operation of the new moratorium provisions introduced by the Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020. Sir Alastair Norris, sitting as a High Court judge, has rejected a creditor's attempt to bring a moratorium to an end following a monitors' decision not to terminate the moratorium.

The changes to the director disqualification regime brought by the Rating (Coronavirus) and Directors Disqualification (Dissolved Companies) Act 2021 (the "Act") come into effect on 15 February 2022. We discuss the extension of disqualification proceedings and the impact on directors here.

The Changes

One year ago, we wrote that, unlike in 2019, when the large business bankruptcy landscape was generally shaped by economic, market, and leverage factors, the COVID-19 pandemic dominated the narrative in 2020. The pandemic may not have been responsible for every reversal of corporate fortune in 2020, but it weighed heavily on the scale, particularly for companies in the energy, retail, restaurant, entertainment, health care, travel, and hospitality industries.

In 2019, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit made headlines when it ruled that creditors' state law fraudulent transfer claims arising from the 2007 leveraged buyout ("LBO") of Tribune Co. ("Tribune") were preempted by the safe harbor for certain securities, commodity, or forward contract payments set forth in section 546(e) of the Bankruptcy Code. In that ruling, In re Tribune Co. Fraudulent Conveyance Litig., 946 F.3d 66 (2d Cir. 2019), cert. denied, 209 L. Ed. 2d 568 (U.S. Apr.

CVAs continued to be a popular restructuring tool in 2021. As the retail industry gears up for what is expected to be a busy festive period, it marks the end of another year in which the close scrutiny and attempted challenge by landlords to retail CVAs continued.

What is a CVA?

Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) is the overarching name given to the different processes used to determine disputes between parties out with a formal court process. ADR is becoming more popular, but is not as widely used by insolvency practitioners (IPs) in the UK to resolve disputes arising from an insolvency event as it perhaps should be.

The most recent UK and Scotland-specific statistics seem to show that the low comparative levels of corporate insolvency that we have seen as a result of the COVID-19 temporary measures may be coming to an end.

The Accountant in Bankruptcy (AiB), the Scottish equivalent of the Insolvency Service, reports that the number of Scottish companies becoming insolvent or entering receivership increased by over 80% in the second quarter of 2021-22, with 211 companies becoming insolvent compared with 117 in the same quarter of 2020-21.

In a recent decision that will be of considerable interest to insolvency practitioners, the English High Court dismissed a challenge to a liquidator's decision to assign causes of action originally vested in an insolvent company to a specialist insolvency litigation financing company.