With two decisions (No. 1895/2018 and No. 1896/2018), both filed on 25 January 2018, the Court of Cassation reached opposite conclusions in the two different situations

The case

The Constitutional Court (6 December 2017) confirmed that Art. 147, para. 5, of the Italian Bankruptcy Law does not violate the Constitution as long as it is interpreted in a broad sense

The case

With the decision No. 1195 of 18 January 2018, the Court of Cassation ruled on the powers of the extraordinary commissioner to require performance of pending contracts and on the treatment of the relevant claims of the suppliers

The case

The Court of Cassation with a decision of 25 September 2017, No. 22274 confirms that Art. 74 of the Italian Bankruptcy Law provides a special rule, which does not apply to cases to which it is not explicitly extended

The case

With the decision No. 1649 of 19 September 2017 the Court of Appeals of Catania followed the interpretation according to which a spin-off is not subject to the avoiding powers of a bankruptcy receiver

The case

Much has already been said about the demise of Carillion and the impact of its liquidation on the various parties with whom it contracted. In this article, I would like to examine what light the demise of Carillion throws on themes commonly encountered within insolvency and whether there are lessons to be learned for everyone.

Having read the various reports in the press, it is clear that whilst Carillion entered into multi-billion pound government contracts, the contracts had extremely small profit margins, ultimately rendering the business unsustainable.

Applicable law

The Italian Government has been delegated to enact a comprehensive restatement of the whole set of rules of insolvency procedures, with specific innovative addresses regarding (to mention only the most important) the concordato preventivo procedure, venue rules, an out-of-court mediation alert process to timely address a risk of insolvency, new forms of security and a streamlined set of priorities among creditors

Introduction

When faced with bankruptcy proceedings, it is paramount that you act quickly in order to avoid unnecessary costs and stress.

The bankruptcy proceedings

The Court of Padua (15 June 2017) ruled that, in the procedure provided by Legislative Decree No. 270/1999, the three-year statute of limitations period provided by Art. 69-bis of the Italian Bankruptcy Law starts from the declaration of insolvency and not from the authorization of the plan for the sale of the business

The case