The administrators of collapsed forex currency broker Alpari (UK) have announced that the creditors’ meeting will be held on 12 March. See the link below for further details.
The government has indicated that it will raise the financial threshold for creditors petitioning for an individual's bankruptcy through an amendment to the Insolvency Act 1986. From 1 October 2015 a creditor will need to be owed at least £5,000, rather than £750 as at present. This change, coming very shortly after the recent abolition of the remedy of distress, will inevitably serve to further limit landlords' armouries when attempting to recover arrears from tenants.
Re Christophorus 3 Limited [2014] EWHC 1162 (Ch)
An investigation is to be carried out into the causes of the bankruptcy of OW Bunker (“OWB”), the largest ship fuel supplier in the world. Investigators from two Danish law firms and Ernst & Young will try to establish the reasons for the failure of OWB less than a year after it was listed at a value of $1 billion. OWB has blamed its failure on hedging losses of $150 million, attributable to the falling price of oil and on a credit line estimated at between $120 and $130 million given by OWB’s subsidiary in Singapore, Dynamic Oil Trading (“DOT
On Monday, November 17, 2014, the United States Supreme Court agreed to decide a critical issue for mortgage lenders and secondary market investors, whether Section 506(d) of the Bankruptcy Code allows a Chapter 7 debtor to “strip off” a junior mortgage lien when the outstanding senior debt exceeds the current value of the senior lien. Bank of America, N.A. v. Caulkett, No. 13-1421, 2014 WL 2207208 (U.S. Nov. 17, 2014); Bank of America, N.A. v. Toledo-Cardona, No. 14-163, 2014 WL 3965212 (U.S. Nov. 17, 2014).
Contexte
En février 2012, la fermeture des hauts fourneaux de Florange divise la classe politique. Le président François Hollande s’engage alors à ce que désormais tout société voulant mettre fin à son activité en France soit soumise à l’obligation de rechercher un repreneur.
Background
In February 2012, following the highly political closing of the Florange site, a steel production plant, President François Hollande vowed that going forward any company wanting to close down its operations in France would have an obligation to first look for a purchaser.
D & D Wines was a leading distributor of wines, which went into administration. One of its clients was an Australian wine producer called Angove. Two of Angove’s customers, who dealt through D & D, paid the company shortly after it had gone into administration and after Angove had terminated the agency agreement. Despite this, the Court of Appeal ruled that the money belonged to the company in administration for the benefit of all its creditors and was not held on trust for Angove.
Given the unfortunate reputation of French courts for awarding substantial damages to employees for unfair terminations, US corporations with operations in France are anxious to limit their financial and legal exposure in case of litigation initiated by their French workforce. How to achieve this efficiently is a far from rhetorical question as French employees frequently pull in the US parent company as a named defendant. The recent decision of the French Supreme Court [Cass. Soc.
Re Christophorus 3 Limited [2014] EWHC 1162 (Ch)