J. Paul Getty once said, “Formula for success: rise early, work hard, strike oil.” However, with crude oil prices nearly half of what they were a mere six months ago, Getty’s formula may not hold as true as it once did. In the latest EIA STEO Report (April 2015), the DOE projects oil prices for WTI to remain around or below $60 per barrel for the balance of 2015 and grow to $70 per barrel in 2016.

The Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Act (the Act) recently received Royal Assent. The Act introduces a number of new provisions across a wide range of issues, including regulatory reform, public sector procurement and companies. In relation to the insolvency and restructuring sector, there are a number of provisions which are likely to garner significant interest in the coming months.

On May 30, 2014, hedge fund Moore Capital (Moore) brought suit against the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy estate (Lehman) in the Southern District of New York bankruptcy court, seeking a declaratory judgment that it acted properly when it terminated swap agreements and setoff termination amounts in the time between the filing of the parent company Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. (LBHI) and the eve of bankruptcy filings weeks later of Moore’s Lehman counterparties¹.

On Thursday 26th February, the Ministry of Justice announced that the insolvency exemption to sections 44 and 46 of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (‘LASPO’) will continue for the time being, having been scheduled to come to an end in April 2015.

The insolvency exemption allows office holders in insolvency procedures to continue to recover from a losing party:

As disclosed recently in a bankruptcy court filing, on January 27, 2015, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (“FinCEN”) imposed a $10 million civil money penalty pursuant to the Bank Secrecy Act (the “BSA”) on Trump Taj Mahal Associates LLC. Trump Taj Mahal consented to the imposition of the penalty (subject to the bankruptcy court’s approval) and admitted that its conduct violated the BSA. This $10 million penalty, reported to be the largest BSA penalty ever imposed upon a casino, highlights the government’s ongoing focus on the gaming industry.

A bankruptcy remote entity is a special-purpose vehicle (or special purpose entity) (“SPV”) that is formed to hold a defined group of assets and to protect them from being administered as property of a bankruptcy estate. SeePaloian v. LaSalle Bank Nat’l Assn (In re Doctors Hospital of Hyde Park, Inc.), 507 B.R. 558, 701, 702 (N.D. Ill. 2013). Bankruptcy remote entities are intended to separate the credit quality of assets upon which financing is based from the credit and bankruptcy risks of the entities involved in the financing. See id.

Oil price movement through 2014 and into 2015 is a consequence of market fundamentals. Europe’s continued economic woes, paired with the slowdown in China’s economy, have led to a fall in demand for oil.

At the same time, the growing U.S. shale-oil boom (over which OPEC has no control) and the pick-up in drilling in Libya have led to an excess of supply. However, in the past few months the issue has switched from how quickly oil prices have fallen, to how much further they have to fall.

Bank of Tokyo-Mitsuibishi UFJ Ltd v Sanko Mineral (The MV Sanko Mineral) [2014]EWHC 3927 (Admlty)

Cargo Interests began proceedings in the U.S. against the Defendant former owner of the M/V SANKO MINERAL for breach of a contract of carriage. The bill of lading under which the claim was brought incorporated the terms of a charterparty which contained a time bar of 12 months from discharge of cargo.

Singularis Holdings Limited v PricewaterhouseCoopers [2014] UKPC 36

PricewaterhouseCoopers v Saad Investments Company Limited [2014] UKPC 35

The Privy Council gives credence to the concept of “modified universalism” (being the court’s common law power to assist foreign winding up proceedings) and notes some of the circumstances which would permit a “stranger” to a winding up order the opportunity to challenge that order.

The facts:

German insolvency law, unlike US insolvency law, only recently introduced (in 2012) the so-called protective shield proceedings (Schutzschirmverfahren) to enable potentially illiquid and/or over-indebted debtors to restructure the company on the basis of a so-called insolvency plan. Thereby, the liquidation of a company by a future insolvency administrator can be avoided.