The sun has set. Yes it has.

The $7,500,000 eligibility limit for Subchapter V expired yesterday (March 28, 2022), without action by Congress to extend it.

Actually, the Subchapter V sun was set to set on March 27—but that’s a Sunday. So let’s give the benefit of the doubt and say it expired on Monday, instead.

Either way, the heightened debt limit is gone.

Hopefully, Congress can pass the heightened limit anew, after its expiration. Then, perhaps, we can be in a no-harm, no-foul mode, with no ill-effects to anyone. But that remains to be seen.

With the Commercial Rent (Coronavirus) Bill having received Royal Assent, Penningtons Manches Cooper’s real estate litigation team sets out below an overview of the restrictions now coming into force.

There are restrictions on the service of statutory demands and winding-up petitions where a debtor company is unable to pay sums claimed due to coronavirus, which are due to expire on 31 March 2022.

With the Commercial Rent (Coronavirus) Bill (the Bill) now in its final stages, Penningtons Manches Cooper’s real estate litigation team sets out below an overview of the new restrictions that will come into force when the Bill is given Royal Assent.

Current restrictions

It may first be beneficial to review the current moratorium that is in place. The majority of these restrictions expire on 25 March 2022 and the insolvency restrictions expire on 31 March 2022 but, until those dates, the following apply:

Here’s a vindication for the Small Business Administration’s discrimination against bankruptcy debtors:

How much precedential value does an 1885 opinion of the U.S. Supreme Court deserve on a bankruptcy discharge issue?

That’s a central question in the Petition for a Writ of Certiorari before the U.S. Supreme Court in Bartenwerfer v. Buckly, Case No. 21-908 (“Distributed for Conference of 4/29/2022”).

Facts of the Case [Fn. 1]

A Petition for certiorari is before the U.S. Supreme Court in Speech & Language Center, LLC, and Chryssoula Marinos-Arsenis v. Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey

Petition’s Question

The Question presented in the Petition is this:

In a few months, Justice Stephen G. Breyer is set to retire from the U.S. Supreme Court.

The bankruptcy world will miss him.

The reason for discussing this subject now (instead of waiting for the retirement to actually happen) is this:

• The triumph of Justice Breyer’s Footnote 2 in Merit Management, as accomplished by a denial of certiorari on 2/22/2022.

What follows is a summary of four important Supreme Court bankruptcy opinions in which Justice Breyer played a significant role—starting with the Footnote 2 opinion.

Claims are “impaired,” unless the plan “leaves” their rights “unaltered.”§ 1124(1).

This rule is not as simple and unequivocal as it seems, according to an In re Hertz opinion. [Fn. 1] Here’s why.

Plan Treatment of Unsecured Claims

Claims of unsecured creditors in the Hertz bankruptcy are treated, under its Chapter 11 Plan, as follows:

Imagine this: a U.S. District Court enters judgment in a case that’s “related to” a bankruptcy, and we want to file a motion for new trial or to amend the judgment.

So, which deadline applies to the motion:

Lots of things are wrong with the student loan program in these United States. For example:

• It’s a corporate-welfare program for high-price colleges; but
• Their students pay the price.

Unfortunately, the safety valve protection for students (i.e., a bankruptcy discharge) has failed them—and made the problem worse!

Here’s how