Insurers with unwanted runoff blocks of business should consider the latest guidance from insurance regulators on potential transactional structures that could mitigate this issue.
The Supreme Court of NSW refused to validate the appointment of a voluntary administrator (Administrator) to Premier Energy Resources Pty Ltd (Company) under section 447A of the Corporations Act 2001 (Cth) (Act) after the Administrator failed to investigate allegations of fraud surrounding his appointment.
Cooper as liquidator of Runtong Investment and Development Pty Ltd (in liq) v CEG Direct Securities Pty Ltd [2024] FCA 6
Companies in Chapter 11 must publicly report substantial financial information — indeed, more information should be reported or available publicly in Chapter 11 than outside of Chapter 11. This paper analyzes what information must be publicly reported or disclosed under the securities laws, the Bankruptcy Code and Bankruptcy Rules; what debtors do to minimize public reporting; and what creditors can do to get the public reporting they deserve.
Debtors May Stop Public Reports Under the Securities Laws.
Commonwealth of Australia v Tonks [2023] NSWCA 285
In this decision, the Court of Appeal of the Supreme Court of NSW considered the interplay between the priority regimes under ss 556 and 561 of the Corporations Act 2001 (Cth) (Act) in resolving a contest between a liquidator’s claim for remuneration and the entitlements of former employees to be paid out of circulating assets.
The Court of Appeal confirmed the first instance decision of Justice Black in finding that:
In a welcome clarification for administrators, the UK Supreme Court in the recent case of R (on the application of Palmer) v Northern Derbyshire Magistrates’ Court[1], held that an administrator appointed under the Insolvency Act 1986 (IA 1986) is not an “officer” of the company for the purposes of section 194(3) of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 (TULRCA).
In this client alert, we set out the key findings by the Court of Appeal in Darty Holdings SAS v Geoffrey Carton-Kelly [2023] EWCA Civ 1135, which considers an appeal against the High Court decision that a repayment by Comet Group plc (“Comet”) of £115 million of unsecured intra-group debt to Kesa International Ltd (“KIL”) was a preference under section 239 of the Insolvency Act 1986 (the “Act”).
Background to the Case
Whilst commonplace in the U.S., uptier transactions in which a borrower teams up with a subset of creditors to issue new “super priority” debt by amending or exchanging existing debt documents, have not been widely used in Europe.
However, with increasing macro economic pressures and financial market instability, we may see more European borrowers taking advantage of flexibility in cov-lite debt documentation to implement liability management transactions as an alternative to, or even as part of, more formal restructurings.