Delaware’s Bankruptcy Court has recently issued two insightful opinions that impact a creditor’s ability to establish the “receipt” element of a valuable 503(b)(9) administrative expense priority claim.

In an era when goods or materials often originate from suppliers or manufacturers outside the United States, bankruptcy courts are grappling with when “receipt” of goods occurs for the purpose of 503(b)(9) claims.

Many creditors who have supplied goods to a debtor before a bankruptcy case begins think their only prospects for recovery will be pennies on the dollar. While often times, pre-petition claims are relegated to receive small, if any, distributions, there is a unique carve-out in Section 503(b)(9) of the Bankruptcy Code that elevates “goods” supplied in the 20 days before a bankruptcy filing to administrative expense status.

Lenders and secured creditors often require that debtor-customers direct all receivable collections into a lockbox, hoping to wrangle any available proceeds to apply to their debtors’ outstanding debt. In requiring a debtor or its customer to remit payments to a lockbox, however, creditors may be overlooking a potential source of significant liability. A creditor using a lockbox may unwittingly expose itself to greater risk and liability than just a debtor’s default if it receives funds that were collected as sales tax on a debtor’s goods or services.

Yesterday, a federal judge preliminary approved a $125 million cash settlement for former shareholders of New Century Financial Corp. (“New Century”). New Century was the second largest subprime mortgage originator before it filed for bankruptcy in April 2007. In February 2008, Michael J.

Late last week, the Governing Committee of the Fund for Orderly Bank Restructuring (FROB) met to discuss the restructuring of Caja de Ahorros y Monte de Piedad de Cordoba (CajaSur).

On Friday, the Washington Department of Financial Institutions closed Washington First International Bank, headquartered in Seattle, Washington, and appointed the FDIC as receiver. As receiver, the FDIC entered into a purchase and assumption agreement with East West Bank, Pasadena, California, to assume all of the deposits of the failed bank.

Today, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) announced the close of a Rule 144A sale of $1.8 billion principal amount of notes backed by 103 non-agency residential mortgage backed securities (RMBS) from seven failed bank receiverships.

Yesterday afternoon, the House Judiciary Committee held Part II of its series of hearings entitled “Too Big to Fail – the Role for Bankruptcy and Antitrust Law in Financial Regulation Reform.” Yesterday’s hearing focused on proposed financia

On Thursday, General Motors Corporation (GM) filed its Annual Report on Form 10-K with the Securities and Exchange Commission which notably included an opinion of its auditors on its financial statements in which the auditors stated that GM’s “recurring losses from operations, stockholders’ deficit, and inabili