Welcome to the eighth edition of our quarterly disputes newsletter, which covers key developments in the dispute resolution world over the last three months or so.
The long awaited Sequana Supreme Court judgment[1] has provided some welcome clarity around the duties of the directors of a company in the "twilight zone" – i.e. where the company is facing financial difficulties.
The Insolvency Service has recently published its interim report (the "Report") which considers the three permanent measures that were introduced pursuant to the Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020 ("CIGA"). For further details on the temporary and permanent measures introduced pursuant to CIGA, see our previous update.
Recreational cannabis is now legal in 19 states and Washington D.C., driving the growth of legal cannabis sales estimated at $33 billion this year—up 32% from 2021—and expected to reach $52 billion by 2026.[1] This movement signals that financial investment in cannabis is not abating but accelerating notwithstanding the impact of the lingering COVID-19 pandemic.
As outlined in our previous briefing note on the Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020, a new restructuring tool was introduced in June 2020 in the form of the Part A1 free-standing moratorium (the "Moratorium").
Welcome to the sixth edition of our quarterly disputes newsletter, which covers key developments in the dispute resolution world over the last three months or so.
As of November 1, 2021, dealers in security-based swaps (“SBS”) whose dealing activity exceeds certain de minimis thresholds (e.g., gross notional amount of $3 billion for credit default SBS, $150 million for other SBS, and $25 million for SBS where the counterparty is a special entity) are required to register with the SEC as a security-based swap dealer (“SBSD”) and to comply with the SEC’s regulations applicable to SBS.
The High Court has dismissed a challenge to Caffe Nero's company voluntary arrangement (CVA) in Young v Nero Holdings Limited. The Applicant in the proceedings, Mr Young, was a landlord of premises let to the First Respondent, Nero Holdings Limited (the Company) and challenged the Company's CVA under s 6(1)(a) and (b) of the Insolvency Act 1986 (the Act).
Most restructuring professionals will tell you that there is no “typical” restructuring. That is absolutely true. Every financially distressed business is different and the character and direction of its restructuring will be highly dependent upon, among others, its capital structure, its liquidity profile, and the level of support it can build for its reorganization among key stakeholder bodies. Nevertheless, there are some important similarities in the way that any company should initially address a distressed situation.
In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, legislation was introduced during 2020 to prevent creditors filing statutory demands and winding up petitions on the basis of their debtor's inability to pay its debts, unless it could be shown that non-payment was not a result of the pandemic. These temporary measures had been extended a number of times during the pandemic as businesses continued to suffer the effects of multiple lockdowns and trading restrictions, but are now gradually being phased out.