As the economy continues to face challenges and the threat of bankruptcy becomes more prevalent among businesses, landlords must be more vigilant in protecting their interests in commercial leases. One area of particular concern is leases that fall under Section 467 of the Internal Revenue Code (“Section 467 Leases”).

The collapse will have far reaching ramifications for many businesses and financial institutions across the UK

On Friday 10 March 2023 it was announced that the Bank of England intends to place Silicon Valley Bank UK Limited (SBV UK) into a Bank Insolvency Procedure following the collapse of its parent company, Silicon Valley Bank, in the US.

Last year saw the construction industry face significant challenges, insolvency levels were up with over 5,000 company failures and nearly 23,000 companies in distress by the last quarter.

Construction businesses in the North-East had the second highest sector insolvency rates, with an estimated 540 companies suffering from distress in the last quarter of 2022 –  the highest of any sector.

This distress has now come to fruition with the recent insolvencies of two of the North East’s largest main contractors, Metnor Construction and Tolent Construction.

Womble Bond Dickinson Restructuring Partner Samuel Dixon joins our Restructuring Advisory Partner Phil Reynolds to discuss potential resilience strategies

After facing down the challenges of COVID, the arts and cultural sector is facing a new suite of financial pressures.

In our latest report, Partners Alastair Massey and Phil Reynolds examine the retail landscape

Over one in five (22%) retail businesses in the UK aren’t confident of trading through to the end of 2023, according to new research published in our retail report.

The U.K. government has published its much-anticipated proposals for regulating the cryptoasset industry. These proposals, currently in the form of a consultation, will see many (but not all) cryptoasset-related activities being brought within the regulatory perimeter for financial services in the U.K.

I was recently reminded of an upcoming presentation my colleague Dan Conway, and I are due to be delivering to the Association of Professional Compliance Consultants (APCC) on wind down planning and the importance of an effective and executable plan for FCA-regulated businesses.

On October 12, the Honorable Robert D. Drain, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge for the Southern District of New York, issued his final decision from the bench in the bankruptcy cases of supermarket chain Tops Holdings II Corporation (“Tops”). The decision came in an adversary proceeding seeking to avoid four dividend payments totaling $375 million from 2009–2013 paid to the Tops’ private equity investors (the “PE Group”) as constructive and actual fraudulent transfers and also hold the director-defendants responsible for breaching their fiduciary duties.

Will 2023 be a year of administrations?

In our last article, we discussed the prospect of 2022 being a year defined by inflation – a point that was only heightened by a weekend of tepid Black Friday sales for retailers.

Last month, Judge Caproni of the Southern District of New York issued a ruling stating that if a commercial lease does not require a landlord to hold a security deposit in trust and if there is no state statute generally requiring landlords to do so, the security deposit may not be recoverable by the tenant when the landlord files for bankruptcy. See 10FN Inc. v. Cerberus Business Finance LLC, 21-5996 (S.D.N.Y. Oct. 18, 2022).