For the past 15 years, trust preferred securities (TruPS) have constituted a significant percentage of the capital of many financial institutions, mostly bank holding companies.Their ubiquity, both as a source of capital and as a common investment for banks, made them a quiet constant for many financial institutions. Even in the chaos of the Great Recession, standard TruPS terms allowed for the deferral of interest payments for up to five years, easing institutions’ cash-flow burdens during those volatile times.
In In re MPM Silicones, LLC, Case No. 14-22503 (RDD) (Bankr. S.D.N.Y. Sept. 30, 2014) (Momentive), the court dismissed a senior lien creditors’ suit alleging that the junior lien creditors breached an intercreditor agreement (ICA) with respect to shared collateral by taking and supporting certain actions adverse to the senior lien creditors.
BACKGROUND
The lead-participant relationship arising from a loan participation has become a fairly contentious one over the last two years as the interests of the two have diverged. For example, loan participants that may be in a troubled condition are never terribly anxious to hear that the lead bank has obtained a current appraisal of the primary collateral. Likewise, a strong loan participant my push a weak lead bank to take more decisive action regarding collecting the loan and possibly foreclosing on the collateral.
On August 29, 2014, Judge John T.
Who Should Read This? Anyone that deals in distressed debt, and in particular anyone that acquires distressed or defaulted bond debts.
One of the most dramatic tools a lender can use in the collection of a loan is the involuntary bankruptcy case. It is dramatic because of the implications for both the debtor and the lender who files the case.
In Lewis Brothers Bakeries, Inc. and Chicago Baking Co. v. Interstate Brands Corp. (2014 WL 2535294 (8th Cir. June 6, 2014)), the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, sitting en banc, held that a perpetual, royalty-free, assignable, transferable, exclusive trademark license granted in connection with a substantially consummated asset purchase agreement was not an executory contract that could be assumed or rejected by the licensor-debtor in bankruptcy.
On June 12, the United States Supreme Court in Clark v Rameker resolved the question that has recently split the 5th and 7th Circuits– Are inherited IRAs protected from the beneficiary’s creditors in a bankruptcy proceeding? The Court unanimously held that they are not.
In 2012, the Fifth Circuit ruled in In re Chilton that inherited IRAs constituted retirement funds within the “plain meaning” of §522 of the Bankruptcy Code and were thus exempt from the bankruptcy estate, under § 522(d)(12) (the federal exemptions). See our prior discussion of this case here.
After Chilton, many thought the issue was settled.
A federal district court has ruled that a distressed debt fund is not a “financial institution” for purposes of the assignment provisions of a loan agreement.
Background