A measure that places a Receiver in charge of Harrisburg’s finances is expected to be approved by the Senate on October 17, despite the recent move by City Council to file for bankruptcy.

“From our point of view nothing has changed,” said State Rep. Glen Grell, R-Cumberland, who worked on the Receiver legislation with State Senator Jeff Piccola, R-Dauphin. “The bankruptcy move is specifically forbidden under legislation we passed in June. I don’t think there’s any doubt it will be challenged and pretty quickly dismissed.”

Borders has long collected personal information from customers and promised that such information would not be disclosed without consent. In light of that and Borders' current bankruptcy proceedings, the FTC has sent a letter to the consumer privacy ombudsman overseeing the Borders bankruptcy that seeks the protection of customer personal information.

Sections 216 and 217 of the Insolvency Act impose draconian sanctions on directors of liquidated companies who reuse "prohibited names". Prohibited names are names that are identical to, or "suggest an association with", a company that has gone into liquidation and of which they were previously directors. The sanctions include criminal penalties and personal liability for debts. It has always been difficult for advisers to confidently advise directors whether a proposed name for a new company would be a prohibited name, given the vague nature of the phrase "suggest an association".

Two recent opinions from separate federal courts of appeal upheld the dismissal of lawsuits by sophisticated investors that suffered losses in the auction rate securities ("ARS") market against the securities broker-dealers that allegedly fraudulently induced the purchase of the ARS.1

As reported in our recent e-update on the case of Echelon Wealth Management Limited (in liquidation), Lord Glennie has determined that liquidators who are removed from office have no right to retain assets as security for remuneration and costs.  Lord Glennie then went on to consider how the court, in determining the level of a liquidator’s remuneration, should view the conduct of the liquidator. 

In a recent case in relation to the liquidation of Echelon Wealth Management Limited ("E"), Lord Glennie has decided that upon removal as liquidator, a former liquidator may not retain from the assets of the liquidated company any sum as security for costs.

The Facts

S&C were appointed joint liquidators of E at a creditors meeting on 16 December 2008. At a creditors meeting on 22 July 2009, they were then removed from office with new joint liquidators being appointed.

In its ministerial statement this week in relation to its consultation on the proposals for a restructuring moratorium, the Government has indicated that it now proposes to consider implementing measures to tackle the unreasonable use of termination clauses in insolvencies.

What Are Termination Clauses?

Termination clauses are, of course, found in most commercial agreements and are a means by which a party may terminate an agreement on the occurrence of certain events (invariably including insolvency of the other party).

In the recent English Court of Appeal case of Rubin v Coote, the court allowed a liquidator to settle litigation without having obtained the agreement of all creditors to the compromise.

The Facts

The recent Court of Session case of Tayplan Limited (in administration) v Smith, is particularly interesting as it is a case where the administrator chose to pursue directors for breach of fiduciary duties rather than using any of the more common statutory remedies.

The Facts

Tayplan Limited was a family business with two directors - Mr Smith senior and Mr Smith junior. Mr Smith senior and his wife each held 50% of the shares in the Company.

The Insolvency Service ("IS") has published a consultation on proposed reform to the regulation of insolvency practitioners. The consultation responds to various recommendations made last year by the Office of Fair Trading ("OFT") in their study entitled, "The Market for Corporate Insolvency Practitioners".