任何在中国内地（“”）注册成立的企业，如不能清偿到期债务，并且资产不足以清偿全部债务或者明显缺乏清偿能力的，可由该企业或其债权人（“”）提交破产申请，继而根据《中华人民共和国企业破产法》（“《破产法》”）对该企业发起破产法律程序。但是，长期以来，备受业内人士诟病的是，中国法院迟迟未对破产申请实施立案登记制度。在此背景下，最高人民法院（“”）于2016年7月颁布指导通知[1]（“《2016年最高院通知》”），旨在简化和规范登记破产案件的立案受理工作。

最高院通知：优化立案程序

The High Court this afternoon unanimously dismissed Clive Palmer and Ian Ferguson's challenge to the constitutional validity of section 596A of the Corporations Act.

This means that a liquidator's power to publicly examine and compel the production of documents remains intact and removes any doubt about the powers of liquidators under section 596A of the Corporations Act.

Arguments made by Clive Palmer and Ian Ferguson

In our previous two news alerts,1 we examined decisions that potentially undermine key elements of the legal structures that lenders created in response to their experiences in the United States Bankruptcy Courts during the real estate downturn of 1988 through 1992, including the involuntary restructure of their indebtedness and liens under the cram-down provisions of title 11 of the United States Code (the “Bankruptcy Codeâ€).

Introduction

As a service to energy industry participants, the lawyers of the Oilfield Services and Bankruptcy Practices at Haynes and Boone, LLP have been tracking and reporting industry developments in oilfield service restructurings. Our research includes details on 100 bankruptcies filed since the beginning of 2015, including secured and unsecured debt totals for each case. The total amount of aggregate debt administered in oilfield services bankruptcy cases in 2015- 2016 is more than $14 billion and the average debt of these cases exceeds $144 million.

I. Introduction

The enactment of the Tax Reform Act of 1986, which ended the many tax shelter advantages previously available to real estate investors, coupled with the savings and loan crises, effectively collapsed the real estate boom of the early-to-mid 1980’s. From 1988 to 1993, countless numbers of real estate loans went into default and many real estate borrowers sought to involuntarily restructure their loans through the “cram-down” provisions of Chapter 11 under title 11 of the United States Code (the “Bankruptcy Code”). 

Released in April 2016 the Turnbull Government proposed significant reforms to Australia’s insolvency laws, as part of its National Innovation Science Agenda - designed to strike a balance between encouraging entrepreneurship and protecting creditors, and to reduce the stigma associated with business failure.

Proposed changes in Italian law mean that it should become easier to create certain types of security in Italy and to recover debt. The relevant law is Decree-law no. 59/2016 (“Urgent provisions on insolvency and executive procedures’’) which came into force on 4 May 2016 and which should be converted into binding law by early July.

The main changes introduced by the Decree are as follows:

In most financing transactions, particularly project finance transactions, lenders seek to obtain security over all of a borrower’s assets. One crucial asset that sometimes does not get sufficient attention is insurance proceeds. Lenders are accustomed to ensuring access to the borrower’s insurance coverage through “additional insured” or “loss payee” provisions.