In a significant further application of the Court of Appeal’s reasoning in Adler, Thames Water and Petrofac, the High Court declined to sanction a cross-class cram down restructuring plan proposed by Waldorf Production UK Plc.

Despite optimistic predictions earlier in 2022, slowedglobal growth resulting, in part, from the war in Ukraine has elevated inflation and interest rates, reducing the availability of credit, increasing business borrowing costs and threatening the ability of companies to retain the confidence of their

A new Act, which received Royal Assent on 15 December 2021, extends the existing directors’ disqualification regime to the directors of dissolved companies.

The Commercial List of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice recently granted an order structurally similar to a reverse vesting order in the receivership proceedings of Vert Infrastructure Ltd. (Vert). This first-of-its-kind order was granted on the motion of Vert’s receiver, KSV Restructuring Inc. (KSV).¹

A new bill, which the UK Government introduced to Parliament on 12 May 2021, seeks to extend the existing directors’ disqualification regime to the directors of dissolved companies.

Last week was a busy week for the courts: we reported on the landlord-led challenges to the New Look CVA and the Virgin Active restructuring plan. Neither judgment made happy reading for landlords, with all challenges dismissed in New Look and the restructuring plan sanctioned despite their objections in Virgin Active. The story has slightly improved for landlords today with the court revoking the Regis CVA. There are important findings from Regis, but in itself the judgment will not be sufficient to turn the tide.

The Pensions Regulator (TPR) recently issued its draft guidance on its approach to investigating and prosecuting the new criminal offences under the Pension Schemes Act 2021. In this blog post, we share our thoughts on the level of comfort that might be gleaned in relation to criminal risk if the draft guidance were finalised in its current form, focusing on the particular concerns that would remain for restructuring activity.

Background

Although 2020 may be behind us, the economic conditions and lockdowns caused by the COVID-19 pandemic still linger. With the emerging picture for Canada in 2021 looking to largely resemble that of 2020, many are wondering how long struggling businesses and their creditors can hold their breath while waiting for improved cash flows and customer demand.

As widely blogged about, on 26 June 2020 the Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020 (the Act) came into force, introducing both far-reaching wholescale reforms to the UK’s restructuring toolbox as well as temporary measures dealing with COVID-19 impacts on companies. The two most significant temporary measures for companies facing financial difficulties as a result of the COVID 19 pandemic were:

In March 2020, the UK government announced that changes will be made to enable UK companies undergoing a rescue or restructure process to continue trading, giving them breathing space that could help them avoid insolvency.

The legislation implementing this has now been laid before Parliament in the Corporate Insolvency and Governance Bill. This includes measures intended to tide companies through the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as far-reaching wholesale reforms to the UK’s restructuring toolbox.