City of Chester is the oldest city in Pennsylvania, incorporated as a borough in 1701 and as a city in 1866, and is located on the Delaware River between Philadelphia and Wilmington.

Unfortunately, the City is also in Chapter 9—having filed bankruptcy on November 10, 2022.

The City’s bankruptcy filing causes a ruckus because:

The crypto winter has brought a flurry of bankruptcy filings into the digital asset space. As pioneering cryptocurrency platforms collide with the Bankruptcy Code, unprecedented questions of law have left customers asking a fundamental question: who owns my crypto?

This question is especially prevalent in cases where the debtor company’s platform offered custodial accounts to customers. Digital asset custodial accounts have unusual attributes that have revealed cracks in customer protection when custodians have filed for bankruptcy.

The Italian Government has approved the Legislative decree no. 19 of 2 March 2023 (the “Decree”) implementing in Italy the Directive (EU) 2019/2121 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 November 2019, amending the Directive (EU) 2017/1132 regarding, among other things, cross-border mergers, demergers and transformations.

The U.S. Supreme Court does not like bankruptcy benefits for individual debtors. It really doesn’t.

An example from a couple years ago is Fulton v. City of Chicago, where the U.S. Supreme Court finds a way to declare:

Can a corporate debtor be denied a Subchapter V discharge under § 523(a), despite this § 523(a) language (emphasis added):

• “A discharge under section . . . 1192 [Subchapter V] . . . does not discharge an individual debtor from . . . ”?

A recent Bankruptcy Court opinion (in Avion Funding) says, essentially, this: “No! You can’t paint over explicit statutory language.”[Fn. 1]

Such recent opinion:

The UK High Court has considered and granted permission for a so called “credit bid” in an application by the Special Administrators of Sova Capital Ltd (in special administration) for a substantial portfolio of illiquid Russian securities. The transaction structure, involving the transfer of securities in exchange for the release of a £233m claim against the estate, is unprecedented in the UK where ‘credit bidding’ has no technical recognition.

The U.S. Supreme Court issues its first-ever opinion—of any type—on August 3, 1791. [Fn. 1] But it does not address a bankruptcy question for quite some time thereafter. In fact, the first U.S. law on the subject of bankruptcy did not exist until the Bankruptcy Act of 1800.

First Bankruptcy Opinion

Here’s a hard-knocks rule:

• When you can’t or won’t explain the true reason for taking a position in negotiations or litigation, distrust and suspicion of the worst-possible motives will follow.

An Exhibit A for this rule is an opinion issued February 9, 2023, in In re Heaven’s Landing, LLC, Case No. 20-21350, Northern Georgia Bankruptcy Court (Doc. 145).

Here are illustrative statements from that opinion:

Der BGH hat mit Entscheidung vom 27. Oktober 2022 (IX ZR 145/21) eine langwährende, insolvenzrechtliche Streitigkeit entschieden. In seiner Entscheidung nahm der BGH an, dass sich das Verwertungsrecht des Insolvenzverwalters nach § 166 InsO nicht auf sonstige Rechte erstreckt. Dies legt einen lange bestehenden und intensiv geführten Streit bei, ob sich das Verwertungsrecht neben beweglichen Sachen im Besitz des Verwalters und abgetretenen Forderungen auch auf sonstige Rechte wie insbesondere verpfändete Gesellschaftsanteile oder abgetretene oder verpfändete IP-Rechte erstreckt.

In its decision of October 27, 2022 (IX ZR 145/21), the German Federal Court of Justice (BGH) ruled on a long-running dispute under German insolvency law. In its decision, the Court assumed that the insolvency administrator's right of realization under section 166 German Insolvency Code (InsO) does not extend to other rights.