The Insolvency, Restructuring and Dissolution Act 2018 (the "IRDA") came into force on 30 July 2020. The consolidation of all personal and corporate insolvency and debt restructuring legislation into a single statute, along with other legislative changes, seeks to further strengthen Singapore's position as an international debt restructuring hub. This note highlights the new restrictions on ipso facto provisions effected by the IRDA, which will be of particular interest to loan market participants.

Restrictions on ipso facto clauses

In this series, we look at how various payment rights are treated in bankruptcy. A summary like this could not possibly address every right that might arise in any given bankruptcy case. We have omitted several of the Bankruptcy Code’s more esoteric legal protections and exceptions that arise in specific kinds of bankruptcy cases. When bankruptcy strikes, creditors should always consult a bankruptcy lawyer to understand what actions they need to take to preserve their rights and maximize their recovery.

The Basic Concept of a “Claim”

For a company that is in financial difficulty, but which is still ultimately a viable going concern, a debt for equity swap can be an effective way to restructure its capital and borrowings and, in doing so, strengthen its balance sheet and deal with issues such as over gearing.

A debt for equity swap involves a creditor converting debt owed to it by a company into equity in that company. The effect of the swap is the issue of the equity to the creditor in satisfaction of the debt, such that the debt is discharged, released or extinguished.

On 30 July 2020, the UK Insolvency Service published its quarterly insolvency statistics. Notably:

Retrospective changes introduced by the Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020 to the wrongful trading regime to mitigate the impact of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

On 26 June 2020 the Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020 (“the 2020 Act”) finally entered into force. Since then Simon Newman and Christopher Pask of 1 Chancery Lane’s Property, Chancery and Commercial team have been offering their views on its provisions and their impact over a series of updates.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Mexican courts were closed for the past few months and only received urgent cases.

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a negative impact on the Mexican economy. As a result, Mexican courts have seen a rise in insolvency cases, which are not as common in Mexico compared to other jurisdictions, such as the United States. The rise of insolvency cases imposes new challenges to Mexican courts and Mexico’s laws.

This is a service specifically targeted at the needs of busy non-executive directors. We aim to give you a “heads up” on the things that matter for NEDs in the week ahead – all in two minutes or less.

In this Edition, we consider another recent Panel decision in the insolvency context, RBA’s comments on Australian economic outlook and the looming “return to normal” for regulators as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to drag on.

YOUR KEY BOARDROOM BRIEF

The German Federal Court of Justice (Bundesgerichtshof) recently decided that an insolvency administrator must not rely on the business judgment rule laid down in section 93(1) of the German Companies Act. Section 93(1) provides that a director is not liable to the company if the director reasonably believes that he is well-informed and is acting in the best interests of the company.

The Australian government has taken swift action to enact new legislation that significantly changes the insolvency laws relevant to all business as a result of the ongoing developments related to COVID-19. 

This week's TGIF considers the recent Federal Court case of Krejci, in the matter of Union Standard International Group Pty Ltd (Administrators Appointed) (No 2) [2020] FCA 1111, where the Federal Court ordered the director of a company to disclose passwords to the company’s server