Despite the improvement in the economy since the advent of the “Great Recession,” many businesses nevertheless continue to struggle. Accordingly, lenders are well advised to stay up to date on “best practices” when facing a potential restructure of a troubled loan. In a series of posts, we will address a number of considerations in dealing with a post default loan situation.
Part 1. Good Faith Obligations
The “discharge injunction” of Section 524 of the Bankruptcy Code is one of the most, if not the most, important features of United States bankruptcy law. Debtors in bankruptcy must complete detailed paperwork regarding their assets and liabilities and either turn over their non-exempt assets to a bankruptcy trustee or execute a payment plan that repays all or a portion of their debt.
A bankruptcy remote entity is a special-purpose vehicle (or special purpose entity) (“SPV”) that is formed to hold a defined group of assets and to protect them from being administered as property of a bankruptcy estate. SeePaloian v. LaSalle Bank Nat’l Assn (In re Doctors Hospital of Hyde Park, Inc.), 507 B.R. 558, 701, 702 (N.D. Ill. 2013). Bankruptcy remote entities are intended to separate the credit quality of assets upon which financing is based from the credit and bankruptcy risks of the entities involved in the financing. See id.
A confluence of factors, including high debt, spiraling pension obligations, and lower sales and property tax revenues, has forced more municipalities to face insolvency than any time since the 1930s. The two largest municipal bankruptcies in history — Jefferson County, Ala., and Detroit, Mich. — recently ended. With the economy improving, we may never see the wave of municipal bankruptcies some commentators predicted.
Today’s blog article, which looks at the ability of a debtor to assume, assign, or reject oil and gas “leases” under section 365 of the Bankruptcy Code, is the third in the Weil Bankruptcy Blog series, “Drilling Down,” where we review issues at the intersection of the oil and gas industry and bankruptcy law.
You have a claim against a corporation and/or its officers, but you find out that the corporation is dissolved and there is a successor corporation in its place that appears to be essentially the same corporation. Now what? In Bernard v. Kee Mfg.
NOTABLE BUSINESS BANKRUPTCY DECISIONS OF 2014
ALLOWANCE/DISALLOWANCE/PRIORITY/DISCHARGE OF CLAIMS
On Dec. 8, 2014 the American Bankruptcy Institute Commission to Study the Reform of Chapter 11 (the “Commission”) issued its 2012-2014 Final Report and Recommendations (the “Report”), proposing numerous changes to Chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code (“Code”).
In section IV.E of its report and recommendations of reforms to chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code, the American Bankruptcy Institute Commission to Study the Reform of Chapter 11 (the “Commission”) considered changes to the Bankruptcy Code’s “safe harbor” provisions.
Introduction