Bankruptcy often has a significant impact on the way a business operates. This makes sense, given that businesses going through the bankruptcy process have to figure out a way to make themselves viable after the process is complete. Oftentimes, part of what has to happen for a business to remain viable going forward after a bankruptcy is to sell off assets and portions of the business.

A district court judge in the Middle District of Pennsylvania recently vacated a bankruptcy court’s decision allowing rejection of an oil and gas lease under section 365 of the Bankruptcy Code.  The District Court held that a debtor’s oil and gas lease was a conveyance of an interest in real property and not an executory contract or unexpired lease that could be rejected in bankruptcy under Section 365 of the Bankruptcy Code.

Although almost eight years have lapsed since the chapter 11 cases of Tulsa, Oklahoma-based SemCrude L.P.

The recent TMA Global Annual Conference in Scottsdale Arizona gave us a great opportunity to meet with friends and colleagues old and new and swap intel and war stories!    The buzz at the conference was around the oil and gas sector.   Drilling down: Turmoil in Oil and Gas was the panel moderated by our very own Michael Cuda.   It created immediate and ongoing comment, not just at the conference but also in the wider media.  See web link from 

As predicted at the Commercial Finance Association’s Fourth Annual Energy Summit on September 16th, we should start seeing more and more oil & gas companies struggle to survive in the wake of continued low commodity pricing.  While we witnessed some rebound in pricing towards the end of the summer, the price of oil again dipped to under $50 a barrel in September and the price of gas continues near historic lows, at just under $3.00 MMBtu.  As Philip Cook, the Chief Financ

It seems only fitting that recent decisions by the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York and its bankruptcy court regarding the nature of electricity should have sent, at least initially, a jolt through the energy community.  Perhaps the Southern District court would lead the charge for one side or the other in an ongoing debate over whether electricity constitutes goods or services—a controversy that has potentially far-reaching implications (in bankruptcy cases, concerning the priority of claims of electricity providers, and, in ordinary transactions, for

In a September 18, 2015 order, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York affirmed a bankruptcy court order denying administrative claim treatment to Hudson Energy Services, LLC (“Hudson”) for its retail sales of electricity to the debtor.¹ The decision does not address any “safe-harbor” or forward contract issues, but is among a number of decisions providing for inconsistent treatment of such sales.

With oil prices having fallen more than 50% from June 2014 to January 2015, most pundits expect more companies in the oil & gas (O&G) industry will face significant financial distress in 2015, forcing many to either consolidate or file for bankruptcy.

A bankruptcy court’s characterization of a debtor’s pre-petition conveyance of an overriding royalty interest (“ORRI”) has an important effect on whether that ORRI is part of an oil and gas debtor’s bankruptcy estate and, in turn, what rights the ORRI holder has with respect to that interest. If an ORRI conveyance is characterized as the transfer of a real property interest, the conveyance is generally excluded from the debtor’s bankruptcy estate and the ORRI holder’s interest may not be affected by the bankruptcy.

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