The European Commission has approved, under EU state aid rules, Germany’s plans to grant Air Berlin a temporary €150 million bridging loan. The measure will allow for the orderly winding-down of the insolvent airline without unduly distorting competition in the Single Market.

La Commissione europea ha approvato, in base alle regole comunitarie in materia di aiuti di Stato, il piano della Germania per concedere ad Air Berlin un prestito temporaneo di 150 milioni di euro. La misura permetterà una ristrutturazione ordinata della compagnia aerea insolvente senza distorcere indebitamente la concorrenza nel mercato unico.

The Court of Padua (15 June 2017) ruled that, in the procedure provided by Legislative Decree No. 270/1999, the three-year statute of limitations period provided by Art. 69-bis of the Italian Bankruptcy Law starts from the declaration of insolvency and not from the authorization of the plan for the sale of the business

The case

The Court with two recent decisions (6 April 2017, No. 8903 and 13 April 2017, No. 9547) confirmed that the Public Prosecutor is entitled to file for bankruptcy also in case he became aware of the insolvency in the course of a probe regarding other companies or individuals and within the concordato preventivo procedure.

The case

A decision of the Court of Rimini dated 1st December 2016 states that the competitive bid process provided by Art. 163-bis of the Italian Bankruptcy Law is not mandatory when there is a strict connection between the lease of business and a proposed third-party loan to support the concordato proposal

The case

This interview was conducted by Lucy Trevelyan at LexisNexis. The views expressed by the interviewees are not necessarily those of the proprietor.

Property Analysis: A recent Court of Appeal decision on the payment of service charges, while correct in principal, was wrong on the facts, according to Peter Petts, barrister at Hardwicke Chambers.

Original News

Skelton and others v DBS Homes (Kings Hill) Ltd [2017] EWCA Civ 1139, All ER (D) 196 (Jul)

This article was first published in Insolvency Intelligence 2017 30(6) and is now available on Westlaw.

The High Court confirmed that it is generally not appropriate to present a winding up petition to recover sums due under a construction contract, particularly where those sums are disputed or there is a legitimate cross claim.

A professional negligence claim against trustees in bankruptcy alleging that they had unnecessarily prolonged the bankruptcies and caused the bankrupts’ loss failed. The Trustees had agreed not to take steps in the bankruptcies while Dr Oraki and her husband made repeated applications to set aside the judgment upon which their bankruptcy orders were made and annul their bankruptcies under s 282(1)(a) of the Insolvency Act 1986, which they eventually succeeded in doing.

'B’ appealed an Insolvency Act 1986 (IA 1986) s 279(3) order suspending her discharge from bankruptcy until ‘T’ confirmed B had complied with her IA 1986 duties. B traded through a company, which entered voluntary liquidation in November 2014. B’s personal guarantee of company debt led to a bankruptcy order in February 2015.