On October 17, 2022, Justice Andrea Masley of the NY Supreme Court issued a decision and order denying all but one of the motion to dismiss claims filed by Boardriders, Oaktree Capital (an equity holder, term lender, and “Sponsor” under the credit agreement), and an ad hoc group of lenders (the “Participating Lenders”) that participated in an “uptiering” transaction that included new money investments and roll-ups of existing term loan debt into new priming debt that would sit at the top of the company’s capital structure.

On October 14, 2022, the Fifth Circuit issued its decision in Ultra Petroleum, granting favorable outcomes to “unimpaired” creditors that challenged the company’s plan of reorganization and argued for payment (i) of a ~$200 million make-whole and (ii) post-petition interest at the contractual rate, not the Federal Judgment Rate. At issue on appeal was the Chapter 11 plan proposed by the “massively solvent” debtors—Ultra Petroleum Corp. (HoldCo) and its affiliates, including subsidiary Ultra Resources, Inc.

The Eleventh Circuit has held that amounts paid post-petition for an administrative expense claim under Section 503(b)(9) of the Bankruptcy Code do not reduce the “new value” otherwise available to the creditor as a defense to a preference claim. Auriga Polymers Inc. v. PMCM2, LLC, 2022 U.S. App. LEXIS 19761 (11th Cir. July 18, 2022).

On July 6, Delaware Bankruptcy Court Judge Craig T. Goldblatt issued a memorandum opinion in the bankruptcy cases of TPC Group, Inc., growing the corpus of recent court decisions tackling “uptiering” and other similar transactions that have been dubbed by some practitioners and investors as “creditor-on-creditor violence.” This topic has been a hot button issue for a few years, playing out in a number of high profile scenarios, from J.Crew and Travelport to Serta Simmons and TriMark, among others.

In Jackson v. Le Centre on Fourth, LLC (In re Le Centre on Fourth, LLC), 2021 U.S. App. LEXIS 33845 (11th Cir. Nov. 15, 2021), the Eleventh Circuit rejected creditors’ due process challenge to the release afforded to the debtor’s affiliates in a confirmed Chapter 11 plan.

Florida law provides that a UCC-1 financing statement is “seriously misleading” if it does not include the debtor’s correct name, unless “a search of the records of the filing office under the debtor’s correct name, using the filing office’s standard search logic, if any, would disclose” the financing statement notwithstanding the misnomer. But how much of a search is required?

On August 26, 2020, the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit held that the Bankruptcy Code does not require subordination agreements to be strictly enforced in order for a court to confirm a cramdown plan, so long as the plan does not discriminate unfairly.

The Eleventh Circuit has joined the Second in holding that consent to be called using an autodialer and/or prerecorded messages, given as part of a contract, cannot be unilaterally withdrawn. Medley v. DISH Network, LLC, 2020 WL 2092594 (11th Cir. May 1, 2020).

On December 19, 2019, the Second Circuit held that appellants’ state law constructive fraudulent transfer claims were preempted by virtue of the Bankruptcy Code’s safe harbors that exempt transfers made in connection with a contract for the purchase, sale or loan of a security from being clawed back into the bankruptcy estate for

On January 14, 2020, the Supreme Court of the United States issued a decision resolving the question of whether a motion for relief from the automatic stay constitutes a discrete dispute within the bankruptcy that creates a basis for a final appealable ruling, or whether it simply is a controversy that is part of the broader Chapter 11 case, such that appeals would not need to be taken until the conclusion of the Chapter 11 case.