1. State of the Restructuring Market

1.1 Market Trends and Changes

State of the Restructuring and Insolvency Market

There were 27,359 insolvencies in France as of the end of September 2021, down 25.1% from the same period in 2020, and down 47.9% from September 2019. Such reduction is relatively stable across all sectors, including those most severely affected by the health-related restrictions, such as accommodation and food services (down 44.2% year-on-year) and trade (down 28.1% year on year).

Fewer Insolvencies for More Opportunities

At the end of 2021, corporate bankruptcies (for most company sizes and in most sectors) were at their lowest level compared to the pre-COVID-19 figures from 2019, with a 50% drop in insolvency proceedings and a 10% decrease in pre-insolvency situations. This was largely due to the temporary impact of government emergency measures and support, including:

Corporate restructuring transactions are often motivated by tax planning, though there are usually other legitimate corporate needs to be achieved. The Corporations Tax Code of Japan contains provisions granting the government power to deny the effects of corporate restructuring for tax purposes—e.g., Article 132 (for family company group transactions) and Article 132-2 (for intra-group mergers and other reorganizations). In recent years, Japanese courts have been trying to clarify the standard for denying the tax effect of certain restructuring transactions.