There are plans to establish a new corporate rescue procedure for small companies. Currently termed the Summary Rescue Procedure, it was initially proposed by the Company Law Review Group in October 2020.

The Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment (Department) is now seeking submissions from stakeholders to inform the development of this new restructuring procedure.

Why the need for a new corporate rescue procedure?

The streamlining of the Schemes of Arrangement (Schemes) process under the Companies Act 2014 (CA 2014) provides an option for corporate restructuring and recovery, which may not have been a feasible for some companies or corporate groups in the past.

As many companies continue to suffer economic hardship due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, it is likely that mergers and acquisitions of companies and assets in distress will feature as a significant proportion of overall M&A transactions in Ireland during the coming months.

The sometimes controversial Examinership process, established in 1990, remains a very important tool for Irish companies with viable businesses that find themselves in financial difficulties.

It was established with the intention of preserving employment and benefiting the economy by facilitating corporate recovery. Examinership enables companies that successfully come through the process to do so with new investment and, hopefully, a brighter future that might not have otherwise been possible if the company had been forced into receivership or liquidation.

As the novel coronavirus COVID-19 continues to disrupt economic activity in Ireland businesses are reviewing their corporate structures and funding arrangements to deal with the crisis. In this article, we outline the types of corporate restructuring options that are available under Irish law each of which will be discussed by us in greater detail in a series of subsequent articles.

The High Court of Hong Kong refused to allow a Chapter 11 Trustee to disclose a Decision from Hong Kong winding up proceedings in the US bankruptcy court. The US proceedings were commenced to prevent a creditor from taking action following a breach of undertakings given to the Hong Kong court in circumstances where the company had no jurisdictional connection with the US.

Following our previous article, the Court of Appeal dismissed an appeal following the High Court deciding that a moratorium in relation to restructuring proceedings in Azerbaijan could not be extended in breach of the Gibbs rule, allowing two significant creditors to proceed with their claims in the English Courts.

Despite the debtor's contention that his primary residence was in the United States, the Court held that it had jurisdiction to make a Bankruptcy Order following a petition presented by HMRC.

HMRC presented a bankruptcy petition against Robert Stayton on 30 May 2014 who owed approximately £653,640. The matter came before the court on a number of occasions before the final hearing, with judgment being handed down in November 2018.

A discharged Bankrupt had intentionally misled the Court as to his COMI being in England and Wales in order to obtain a Bankruptcy Order. Four years after the making of the Bankruptcy Order, the Court annulled it on the grounds that the Court did not have jurisdiction to make the Order in the first place.

Ashfords successfully acted for the Joint Trustees in Bankruptcy of Vincent Mascarenhas (deceased) in their application to discharge Freezing Orders, an Interim Charging Order and an Interim Third Party Debt Order obtained by creditors of the late Bankrupt in 2014. The Joint Trustees were not a party to the original proceedings but had standing to make the applications.