The Court of Milan with a decision on 28 May 2014 addressed some heavily debated legal issues: the Bankruptcy Courtmay authorize the debtor to terminate credit facility agreements when the debtor submitted a pre-filing for concordato preventivo (known as “concordato con riserva”)?
The Case
In its decision on the Game Station1 appeal, the Court of Appeal has overturned the cases of Goldacre2 and Luminar3 holding that office holders of insolvent companies must pay rent of property occupied for the benefit of creditors on a “pay as you go” basis irrespective of when rent falls due under the lease.
The facts
a) Continuità diretta e indiretta
Nella precedente esperienza applicativa del concordato, la conservazione dei complessi aziendali in esercizio assai di rado avveniva in capo allo stesso imprenditore, quanto piuttosto solo in via “indiretta”, attraverso la formale cessione ad un soggetto terzo, procedendo, prima del deposito della domanda di ammissione al concordato, alla concessione in affitto al fine di preservarne l'operatività.
The UK’s Insolvency Act 1986 sets out in s.123 various tests to determine whether a company should be deemed unable to pay its debts. The relevance of these tests to distressed companies is obvious: deciding as they do when it is appropriate to seek an administration order or present a winding up petition. They also help determine directors’ duties, antecedent transactions and issues such as wrongful and fraudulent trading.
The UK Supreme Court has handed down an important judgment in the conjoined cases of Rubin and another v Eurofinance SA and others and New Cap Reinsurance Corporation (in Liquidation) and another v AE Grant and others [2012] UKSC 46, which provides vital clarification on the effect of foreign insolvency judgments on the UK courts. The judgment was handed down yesterday.
Background & Court of Appeal
In the present fi nancial climate, customers are increasingly asking for business critical software or other assets to be transferred to the customer should the supplier become insolvent, for the legitimate reason that the customer needs security of supply. Two recent Court of Appeal cases remind us that customers who outsource to and contract with potentially vulnerable service providers need to take account of the “anti-deprivation principle” when doing this.
- Decision will be welcomed by insurers
The Scottish Appeal Court has allowed the appeal by Scottish Lion Insurance against the judgment of Lord Glennie on whether it would ever be fair for a court to sanction a solvent scheme in the face of creditor opposition, says City law firm Reynolds Porter Chamberlain LLP (RPC).
The case of Goldacre v Nortel, decided in December, has clarified the circumstances in which an administrator is liable to pay rent under a lease as an expense of an administration. If rent is an expense of the administration, the landlord will almost certainly be paid in full for as long as the administrator uses the property. If it is not such an expense, the landlord will be an unsecured creditor who will be lucky to receive a few pence in the pound.
In the last edition of Real Estate Update, we considered the position of a landlord wishing to keep the lease of premises to a company in administration ongoing and in what circumstances he will receive the full rent (ie 100 pence in the pound). If, however, the tenant is in administration and the landlord would like to bring the lease to an end, he would only be entitled to forfeit the lease if the administrator consents or the court grants an order giving him permission to do so.1
1. Can I lock the tenant out of the property until they pay?
No. If a tenant has been placed in administration then there will be a moratorium in place. This gives a company some breathing space. Rights against the company, such as forfeiture or conducting legal proceedings, can only be pursued with either the consent of the administrator or a court order. As noted last week, changing the locks is likely to forfeit the lease. Unless you intend to forfeit and obtain the necessary permission to do so, you should not change the locks.