A credit institution that is the indirect owner of an insolvent company’s share capital is not a person closely related to the insolvent company, unless it uses an intermediary to avoid that status.

The court ruled to allow the sale of the production unit with assignment to the acquirer of the agreements involving the insolvent companies affected by the transfer of the production unit and necessary for its continuance.

The European Commission recently published a recommendation addressed to Member States on a new approach to rescuing businesses and offering a second chance to honest entrepreneurs. It aims to ensure that viable businesses experiencing financial difficulti es have access to restructuring mechanisms at an early stage to prevent insolvency and maximise overall value for creditors, employees and owners. It also proposes a second chance for honest entrepreneurs involved in insolvency proceedings.

I  FRAMEWORK OF AVAL

Legal Framework of Aval

The aval consists of a personal guarantee of obligations that is typical of debt securities – in particular bills of exchange, promissory notes and cheques – and enormously important given how often the same is used in practice in the commercial activity, namely the provision of aval to commercial companies, makers of debt securities.

After five years of litigation, on 3 April 2014, the US Department of Justice entered into a settlement agreement with Kerr-McGee Corporation and its parent company, Anadarko Petroleum (“Kerr-McGee”). This agreement requires Kerr-McGee to pay $5.15 billion in order to compensate for its environmental and tort liabilities of the past 85 years.

This agreement came after the 12 December 2013 judgment of the US Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York in Tronox Inc., et al., v. Kerr-McGee Corp., et al. (In re Tronox Inc.), 503 B.R. 239 (Bankr. S.D.N.Y. 2013).

Introduction: The Question

Suite aux faillites d’une quinzaine de boutiques au mois de septembre dernier au centre-ville de Luxembourg et partant du constat de la disparition progressive des commerces en centre-ville ainsi que d’une baisse de la création d’entreprises dans le secteur du commerce de détail, l’ancien gouvernement a émis un avant-projet de loi sur le bail commercial le 4 octobre 2013 (ci-après « l’avant-projet » ou le « projet »).

Financial entities. Royal Decree-Law 14/2013, of November 29, on urgent measures to adapt Spanish law to European Union law on the supervision and solvency of financial entities. (BOE 287, November 30, 2013)

European Union law on the supervision and solvency of financial entities (Basel III) has been incorporated into Spanish law.

Whoever acquires control of a listed company due to a conversion of  debts  into  shares directly attributable to a court-sanctioned refinancing agreement will not have to launch a mandatory bid. This exemption applies automatically without the need for a CNMV evaluation.

INTRODUCTION

Royal Decree-Law 4/2014, of March 7, on urgent measures for refinancing and restructuring corporate debt, substantially amends the Insolvency Act (particularly regarding the regulation of refinancing agreements and their court sanctioning, and other pre-insolvency institutions). It also modifies the exemption on mandatory takeover bids for rescue operations and extends for one more year (and broadens the scope of) the special regime for calculating loss based on impairment in cases of mandatory capital reduction and mandatory dissolution of companies.