In Bailey & Others (Joint Liquidators of D&D Wines International Limited) v Angove’s Pty Limited¹, the Court of Appeal overturned a decision of the High Court, and so permitted the liquidator of an insolvent agent to recover funds due to it from end-customers despite the agency having been terminated.

Background

Despite the absence of any provision in the Bankruptcy Code expressly authorizing the recharacterization of a debt claim to an equity interest, it generally is well-established that recharacterization is within the broad powers afforded a bankruptcy court under section 105(a) of the Bankruptcy Code and is necessary for the proper application of the Bankruptcy Code’s priority scheme.1  In a recharacterization analysis, a

bankruptcy court ignores the labels of a transaction, examines the facts, and determines whether a

Background
Decision on survival of contractual rights
Decision on constructive trust
Comment

The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals recently considered the question of how much protection is required for a secured creditor to be adequately protected. Banker’s Bank of Kansas, N.A. v. Bluejay Properties, LLC (In re Bluejay Properties, LLC), Bankr. No. 12-22680 (10th Cir. Mar. 12, 2014)(unpublished).

The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit (the “Seventh Circuit”) recently adopted a broad reading of the safe harbor of United States Bankruptcy Code (the “Bankruptcy Code”) § 546(e), which protects from avoidance “settlement payments” and transfers made in connection with a “securities contract,” among other transfers.1 In FCStone, the Seventh Circuit reversed the United States District Court for t

The High Court (David Donaldson QC) has held in Enta Technologies Limited v HMRC [2014] EWHC 548 (Ch), that where a winding-up petition was brought by HMRC based on the non-payment of tax raised in assessments and the taxpayer's appeal against those assessments was pending, the winding-up court should refuse to adjudicate on the merits of the appeal and should leave that question to be dealt with by the First-tier Tribunal (Tax Chamber) ('FTT').

Background

The recent Court of Appeal decision in Rawlinson and Hunter Trustees SA & others v Akers & another [2014] serves to emphasise that third party reports commissioned by liquidators to enable them to consider whether litigation should be commenced in order to make recoveries for the benefit of creditors will not always attract litigation privilege.

In its decision on the Game Station¹ appeal, the Court of Appeal has overturned the cases of Goldacre²  and  Luminar³ holding that office holders of insolvent companies must pay rent of property occupied for the  benefit of creditors on a “pay as you go” basis irrespective of when rent falls due under the lease. 

The facts

Recently, two courts of appeal dismissed as moot under 11 U.S.C. § 363(m) appeals of orders   authorizing the sale of assets. The courts’ analysis focused on whether granting the appellant’s relief  from the lower courts’ order would affect the asset sale. Thus the trend in the appellate courts is that only appeals that will not affect the sale itself (such as a dispute over the distribution of sale proceeds) are not subject to being dismissed as moot.

Numerous bankruptcy trustees have attempted to claw back from colleges and universities — and even from private elementary and secondary schools — the tuition payments that parents made on behalf of their children, when the parents subsequently filed for bankruptcy.