On September 8, 2022, a three-judge panel in the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit (the “Second Circuit”) reversed the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (the “District Court”) when it determined that lenders of a syndicated loan facility to Revlon, Inc.
We have previously blogged about Siegel v. Fitzgerald, the Supreme Court decision last June that invalidated the 2018 difference in fees between bankruptcy cases filed in Bankruptcy Administrator judicial districts and U.S. Trustee judicial districts.
The Second Circuit released a new decision this week in Sears regarding bankruptcy valuation methodologies and the entitlement of second lien debt holders to adequate protection. Among other interesting aspects of the ruling, the Second Circuit affirmed the Bankruptcy Court’s adoption of a "net orderly liquidation value" for the debtors’ inventory as of the petition date (rather than looking to the actual values obtained by the debtors during the case).
On May 31, 2009, approximately 30 days after Chrysler Group LLC and affiliated debtors filed for bankruptcy relief, the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York authorized the sale of substantially all of Chrysler’s assets to “New Chrysler” – an entity formed by Chrysler and Fiat Automobiles SpA and initially majority-owned by Chrysler’s Voluntary Employees’ Beneficiary Association (VEBA) – free and clear of liens, claims and encumbrances under section 363 of the United States Bankruptcy Code (the Fiat Transaction).
During the bankruptcy cycle following the recession of 2001, numerous debtors – notably airlines such as US Airways and United Air Lines, Inc. – undertook “distress terminations” of their ERISA-qualified defined benefit pension plans, which are insured by the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC). The PBGC found itself holding large general unsecured claims arising from significant underfunding of pension plans insured by the PBGC as a result of these terminations. Efforts by the PBGC to obtain either administrative priority or secured status for these claims invariably failed.1
On January 6, 2009, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit rendered a decision in the case of Riker, Danzig, Scherer, Hyland & Perretti v. Official Comm. of Unsecured Creditors (In re: Smart World Tech., LLC) that clarifies the implications of a bankruptcy court's "pre-approval" of the terms of a professional's retention by the bankruptcy estate under Sections 327 and 328 of the Bankruptcy Code.
On August 4, 2015, the Second Circuit weighed in for the first time on the circumstances in which the confirmation of a Chapter 11 plan could strip a secured creditor of its lien. In City of Concord, N.H. v.
The legal principles governing corporate finance are often complex. Sometimes, however, the simplest of errors can be the most costly. Such was the case with a large syndicated secured loan made to General Motors. Due to a simple filing error, what had always been intended by the lender and borrower to be a secured loan will be treated as unsecured.
The Second Circuit Opinion in Motors Liquidation
In December 2013, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit held that section 109 of the Bankruptcy Code was applicable to Chapter 15 cases. In Drawbridge Special Opportunities Fund LP v. Barnet (In re Barnet), 737 F.3d 238 (2d Cir.
A popular line of thinking among bankruptcy practitioners and commentators holds that substantive consolidation – the combining of assets and liabilities of a debtor and another debtor or non-debtor entity to satisfy creditor claims against both entities ratably from the resulting pool – is an equitable remedy of judicial invention with no specific foundation in the Bankruptcy Code.