The Australian Federal Government has announced the temporary amendments to insolvency and corporations laws will be extended until 31 December 2020 in light of the continuing challenges of COVID-19.

In brief

The Australian Federal Government has now passed temporary amendments to insolvency and corporations laws in light of the challenges COVID-19 poses to many otherwise profitable and viable businesses.

The Australian Federal Government has announced today (22 March 2020) that it intends to make temporary amendments to insolvency and corporations laws in light of the challenges COVID-19 poses to many otherwise profitable and viable businesses.

In particular, the government intends to relieve directors from the risk of personal liability for insolvent trading, where the debts are incurred in the ordinary course of business.

The Australian Federal Government has announced today (22 March 2020) that it intends to make temporary amendments to insolvency and corporations laws in light of the challenges COVID-19 poses to many otherwise profitable and viable businesses.

In particular, the government intends to relieve directors from the risk of personal liability for insolvent trading, where the debts are incurred in the ordinary course of business.

On 22 August 2019, the Federal Court of Australia (FCA) held that it could make a request to the New Zealand High Court (NZHC) that there be a joint hearing of those courts in respect of applications relating to the pooling of various funds held by companies subject to Australian and New Zealand liquidations, respectively.

Such a ‘letter of request’ could be issued by the FCA to a foreign court in the context of an Australian insolvency process pursuant to section 581 of the Corporations Act 2001 (Cth) (Corporations Act).

On Monday, May 20, 2019 the Supreme Court settled a decades-long circuit split regarding a licensee’s ongoing trademark usage rights following the rejection of a trademark license agreement under the U.S. bankruptcy code. In an eight to one decision, the Court found that “rejection breaches a contract but does not rescind it. And that means all the rights that would ordinarily survive a contract breach, including those conveyed here, remain in place.”

On Wednesday, February 20, 2019, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments for Mission Product Holdings vs. Tempnology, LLC. to decide what it means to “reject” a trademark license agreement in bankruptcy.

After months of negotiations, drafts, compromises, and attorney’s fees, you finally enter into a licensing agreement granting you the right to use someone else’s trademark. Months or perhaps years later, the licensor files for bankruptcy and the bankruptcy trustee rejects the license agreement. Can you continue to use the trademark or does the licensor’s rejection of the licensing agreement effectively prohibit your continued usage of the mark?

In Swiss Cosmeceutics (Asia) Ltd [2019] HKCFI 336, Mr Justice Harris of the Hong Kong Court of First Instance declined to wind up a company despite it failing to establish a bona fide defence on substantial grounds. Mr Justice Harris commented on the difficulties presented by sporadic record keeping, and reiterated the principle that the burden of proof lies with the company to demonstrate a bona fide defence on substantial grounds, despite the existence of anomalies in the petitioner’s claim.

Facts

In a highly international cross-border restructuring, the High Court of Hong Kong has refused to assist the New York-based Chapter 11 trustee of a Singaporean subsidiary of the Cayman-incorporated Peruvian business China Fishery Group (“CFG”).