In the recent decision of Heavy Plant Leasing [2018] NSWSC 707, a creditor successfully defended an unfair preference claim by establishing it did not have reasonable grounds to suspect the insolvency of the debtor company, who was a subcontractor in the earth moving business.
The most common way of defending a liquidator’s unfair preferences claim is to rely upon section 588FG(2) of the Corporations Act 2001(Cth); commonly called the ‘good faith defence’.
A mortgage bank has the power to foreclose and sell the collateral if the debtor is in default. However, this power does not apply in full. There is a risk of abuse of power in this respect. The circumstances, motives and actions of the parties play a major role in this. In this situation, the interests of the mortgage bank and the debtor are diametrically opposed. The mortgage bank has an interest in claiming the outstanding claim and the debtor has an interest in maintaining his immovable property.
As from 1 May 2018, a comprehensive reform of the Belgian insolvency framework entered into force. The old framework consisted of two separate laws governing respectively bankruptcy and judicial reorganization. The new legal framework incorporates both regimes in Book XX of the Belgian Code of Economic Law.
Innovations
Commonly, a creditor being sued by a liquidator to refund an alleged unfair preference is owed money by the company in liquidation.
Liquidators argue that under section 553(c)(1) of the Corporations Act 2001 (Act) a creditor is not able to set-off the outstanding indebtedness owed by the company to the creditor to reduce any liability of the creditor to refund any unfair preference. Similar arguments are made by liquidators in relation to insolvent trading claims.
A snapshot of the court decisions
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On 11 September 2017, the Treasury Laws Amendment (2017 Enterprise Incentives No. 2) Bill 2017 was passed by the Senate. The Bill features two key changes to the Corporations Act:
Just because a liquidator asserts you have received an unfair preference, does not necessarily mean you have or that there are no potential defences available to you.
Bogra is a company that is active within the funeral industry. As a result of serious financial problems, an administrator (bewindvoerder) was appointed on 28 June 2017. On the same date Bogra was declared bankrupt (30 June 2017), the employment agreements of Bogra’s employees were terminated. Funico acquired (part of) Bogra’s assets on 18 July 2017 due to an asset transaction. Effective 19 July 2017, Bogra’s activities were continued by Bogra Uitvaartkisten.
It is common for commercial contracts to contain ipso facto clauses, which allow a party to terminate or modify the terms of the contract where the other party experiences an insolvency event. A concern addressed by the Government is that these clauses can prevent a financially distressed company from turning their situation around.
The High Court’s recent decision in Ramsay Health Care Australia Pty Ltd v Compton [2017] HCA 28 has confirmed a bankruptcy court can exercise a discretion to go behind the judgment debt where sufficient reason is shown for questioning whether there is a debt due to the petitioning creditor.