Recent regulations confirm that the GST/HST deemed trust has priority over all security interests and charges except for land or building charges. That exception has its own limitations. It is limited to the amount owing to the secured creditor at the time the tax debtor failed to remit the GST/HST. It also forces the secured creditor to look first to its other security; a kind of forced marshalling.
The United States Bankruptcy Court recently denied confirmation of a bankruptcy plan even though it found that the plan's global settlement was "fair and reasonable."1 Why? Because the plan's releases were too broad and "unreasonable" for many of the constituents. The case provides a pointed lesson to creditors and debtors alike — pay attention to the releases; overdoing it may sink the whole ship.
On December 16, 2010, the Supreme Court of Canada ( SCC) released its decision in Re Ted Leroy Trucking Ltd. In its decision, the SCC affirmed the importance of the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act (CCAA) as a flexible restructuring tool, and clarified the source and limits of the Court’s authority during CCAA proceedings. Furthermore, the Court overruled the judgment of the B.C.
On October 26, 2010, the British Columbia Court of Appeal (the Court) released its decision in Canadian Petcetera Limited Partnership v. 2876 R Holdings Ltd., 2010 BCCA 469 (Petcetera), an important case that addresses the rights of landlords when a tenant has filed a Notice of Intention to make a proposal (NOI) under the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act (the BIA).
On August 4, 2010, the New Jersey Superior Court, Appellate Division extended equitable principles previously applied in mortgage foreclosure cases to how far an unsecured judgment creditor could go to satisfy its lien against a debtor, deciding to follow a line of cases standing for the principal that “even in the absence of express statutory authorization, a court has inherent equitable authority to allow a fair market value credit in order to prevent a double recovery by a creditor against a debtor.” Moreover, in the case, MMU of New York, Inc. v.
In the recent decision of Justice Cumming In the Matter of the Proposal of Hypnotic Clubs Inc. (“Hypnotic” or the “Debtor”) the court dismissed a motion by the Debtor for a sale of its assets pursuant to s.65.13 of the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act (“BIA”).
Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code is intended to allow financially stressed debtors to restructure their debt obligations through a plan of reorganization. Typically, a Chapter 11 plan places different types of claims in different classes and, subject to various requirements of the Bankruptcy Code, allows the debtor to pay only portions of the claims (and in certain circumstances not to pay certain claims at all). Moreover, the Bankruptcy Code allows a debtor the flexibility to structure a plan to defer the payment of certain claims.
In a recent decision in the Chapter 11 case of Project Orange Associates, LLC1, the court confronted an important issue that often arises in bankruptcy cases: whether the use of conflicts counsel is sufficient to permit court approval under section 327(a) of the Bankruptcy Code of a debtor’s choice for general bankruptcy counsel that also represents an important creditor of the debtor in unrelated matters. Here, the conflict involved the debtor's largest unsecured creditor and an essential supplier.
In a recent decision, the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York distinguished excusable neglect in filing a claim before the expiration of a clear bar date. In a written opinion issued on May 20, 2010 in the case of In re Lehman Brothers Holdings, Inc., et. al, Case No. 08-13555 (JMP), Judge Peck denied seven motions for leave to file late claims finding none satisfied the Second Circuit’s strict standard to find excusable neglect.
In a recent opinion issued in the case In re Philadelphia Newspapers, LLC, et al., Case No. 09-4266 (3rd Cir. 2010), the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit held that secured lenders do not have an absolute right to credit bid on all asset sales under section 1129(b)(2)(A) of the Bankruptcy Code. This opinion could have a profound effect on the manner in which debtors seek approval of a sale pursuant to a plan of reorganization and, potentially, a chilling effect on the willingness of lenders to extend credit in the future.