With the growing concern over the environmental impacts of commercial activity, provinces have enacted and expanded environmental legislation in order to hold companies accountable for the costs of remediating the environmental harm they cause. However, regulators have struggled with how to hold companies accountable for environmental harm when they become insolvent. For many years, clean-up obligations have been treated as unsecured claims lacking priority over secured claims. On January 31, 2019, the Supreme Court o

On February 25, 2019, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit vacated the bankruptcy court’s dismissal of avoidance actions brought by Irving Picard, the trustee (Trustee) for the liquidation of Bernard L.

With the growing concern over the environmental impacts of commercial activity, provinces have enacted and expanded environmental legislation in order to hold companies accountable for the costs of remediating the environmental harm they cause. However, regulators have struggled with how to hold companies accountable for environmental harm when they become insolvent. For many years, clean-up obligations have been treated as unsecured claims lacking priority over secured claims.

A five judge majority of the Supreme Court of Canada has allowed an appeal brought by the Alberta Energy Regulator ("AER") and the Orphan Well Association from the decision of the Alberta Court of Appeal in Orphan Well Association v Grant Thornton Limited, 2017 ABCA 124 ("Redwater"). The case has been one of the most closely watched by the Canadian oil and gas industry in decades.

The dispute in Redwater centred on the renunciation of uneconomic oil and gas wells, pipelines and facilities that are subject to provincial abandonment and remediation liabilities.

A five judge majority of the Supreme Court of Canada has allowed an appeal brought by the Alberta Energy Regulator (“AER”) and the Orphan Well Association from the decision of the Alberta Court of Appeal in Orphan Well Association v Grant Thornton Limited, 2017 ABCA 124 (“Redwater”). The case has been one of the most closely watched by the Canadian oil and gas industry in decades.

In 2017, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit held in In re MPM Silicones, LLC that the appropriate interest rate for replacement notes issued to secured creditors under a “cramdown” Chapter 11 plan must be a market rate if an “efficient market” exists. If no such market exists, however, the formula rate (effectively, the prime rate plus 1-3 percent) must be applied.

We previously wrote about the decision in The Queen v. Callidus Capital Corporation of the Federal Court of Appeal in our Restructuring and Tax Bulletin, here. The decision, released in July 2017, was overturned on November 8, 2018 by the Supreme Court of Canada, offering sought-after certainty for secured lenders. Access the ruling here.

Since the Delaware Supreme Court held in CML V, LLC v. Bax that creditors of a Delaware LLC lack standing to pursue derivative breach-of-fiduciary-duty claims, even if the LLC is insolvent or near insolvent, bankruptcy courts have decided a number of Bax-related issues in cases involving Delaware LLCs.

In a unanimous decision in Merit Mgmt. Grp., LP v. FTI Consulting, Inc., the U.S. Supreme Court addressed the scope of a Bankruptcy Code exception to the “avoiding powers” of a bankruptcy trustee or Chapter 11 debtor-in-possession that permit invalidation (i.e., avoidance and clawback) of a limited category of transfers of property by a debtor or of a debtor’s interest in property.

In U.S. Bank N.A. v. Village at Lakeridge, LLC, the U.S. Supreme Court issued an important decision on standards of appellate review, holding that appellate courts should review a bankruptcy court’s determination of whether a particular creditor is a “nonstatutory insider” for purposes of the Bankruptcy Code under the highly deferential “clearly erroneous” standard of review.