In Short

The Situation: The U.S. Supreme Court considered whether § 363(m) of the Bankruptcy Code, which limits a party's ability to undo an asset transfer made to a good-faith purchaser in a bankruptcy case, is jurisdictional.

The United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York has ruled that a creditor or trustee seeking to recover a subsequent transfer under Section 550(a) of the Bankruptcy Code need not obtain a judgment of avoidance against the subsequent transferee before proceeding with the recovery action.

A chapter 11 plan may be modified after votes have been solicited on the plan, but prior to confirmation, without providing creditors and interest holders with an amended disclosure statement and another opportunity to vote on the modified plan, provided, among other things, that the modifications do not adversely affect creditors or interest holders who previously voted to accept the plan.

A handful of recent high-profile court rulings have considered whether a chapter 11 debtor is obligated to pay postpetition, pre-effective date interest ("pendency interest") to unsecured creditors to render their claims "unimpaired" under a chapter 11 plan in accordance with the pre-Bankruptcy Code common law "solvent-debtor" exception requiring a solvent debtor to pay pendency interest to unsecured creditors. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit weighed in on this question in In re LATAM Airlines Grp. S.A., 55 F.4th 377 (2d Cir. 2022).

Like debtors, bankruptcy trustees, official committees, examiners, and estate-compensated professionals, foreign representatives in chapter 15 cases have statutory reporting obligations to the bankruptcy court and other stakeholders as required by the plain language of the Bankruptcy Code. Such duties include the obligation to keep the U.S. bankruptcy court promptly informed of changes in either the status of the debtor's foreign bankruptcy case or the status of the foreign representative's appointment in that case. Furthermore, chapter 15 provides a U.S.

Exception from Discharge of Debts for Fraud Committed by Business Partner

On February 22, 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its ruling in Bartenwerfer v. Buckley, No. 21-908, 2023 WL 214441 (U.S. Feb. 22, 2023), where it resolved a circuit split in ruling that a debt based on fraud committed by, or a false representation made by, the debtor's partner or agent is nondischargeable in the debtor's bankruptcy case.

In In re Global Cord Blood Corp., 2022 WL 17478530 (Bankr. S.D.N.Y. Dec. 5, 2022), the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York denied without prejudice a petition filed by the joint provisional liquidators for recognition of a "winding-up" proceeding commenced under Cayman Islands law.

上市公司重整是重整领域的风向标，由于其衔接了资本市场和破产制度两大重要领域，且上市公司具有公众性、公开性和稀缺性等特点，因此受到了广泛的关注，可谓是重整皇冠上的一颗明珠。自《中华人民共和国企业破产法》实施至今，共计103家上市公司实施了重整，其中最近四年的重整案例数量占据了总量的半壁江山并呈现出新的特点，同时亦产生诸多前沿法律问题并在一定程度上推动了现行重整制度和证券监管政策的变革和调整。

一、近年上市公司重整所呈现的特点

1. 顶层政策明确支持。2020年，国务院在《关于进一步提高上市公司质量的意见》中，明确提出“支持上市公司通过并购重组、破产重整等方式出清风险”。在实务中，近年来证监会对上市公司重整受理的审查政策适度宽松。主要表现在证监会对于上市公司违规担保、资金占用等问题，有条件地允许其在重整程序之中解决，而此前证监会原则上要求上市公司在进入重整前解决此类问题，致使很多存在违规问题的上市公司对重整脱困之路只能“望洋兴叹”。

In Short

The Situation: Historically, creditors pursued by liquidators under the unfair preference regime could rely on a statutory set-off as a defence to the claim, reducing or eliminating their liability to repay what would otherwise be preference payments, on the basis that the liability for the unfair preference payment formed part of a running account between the creditor and the company.

In Short

The Situation: The High Court of Australia has confirmed in Bryant v Badenoch Integrated Logging Pty Ltd [2023] HCA 2 that the "peak indebtedness rule" is no longer available to liquidators when assessing the value of running accounts in unfair preference claims.