The process that enables creditors to pursue struggling businesses at the Irish High Court has resumed in the north after three years, IrishNews.com reported. The Bankruptcy and Companies Master’s Court in Belfast has reopened to winding up petitions from Monday (April 17). It follows the introduction of the Insolvency (Amendment) Rules (Northern Ireland) 2023 last month, which effectively ended the three-year restriction on creditor winding up petitions.
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The cinema chain has announced that it will no longer be selling its U.K., Irish and U.S. locations despite filing for bankruptcy protection last year, the (U.K.) Gazette and Herald reported. The global company operates brands like Cinema City, Picturehouse, Regal and Planet with 750 locations around the world. On Monday, April 3, it announced that it has now terminated the planned sale after struggling to find an acceptable offer. Instead, the chain will go under financial restructuring of its approximately £4 billion debt pile.
Ireland's domestic economy fell into a technical recession in the final quarter of 2022, Central Statistics Office data showed on Friday, but still grew by 8.2% for the year as a whole while the broader but unreliable measure of GDP powered further ahead, Reuters reported. With Ireland's large multinational sector often distorting gross domestic product (GDP), officials prefer to use modified domestic demand to gauge the strength of the economy and it fell 1.3% quarter-on-quarter, following a 1.1% decline in the third quarter.
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Britain and the European Union have reached a new agreement on post-Brexit trading arrangements for Northern Ireland, raising hopes that more than six years of wrangling over the U.K.’s departure from the bloc may finally come to an end, the Associated Press reported. The deal, announced Monday by British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, is designed to replace existing rules that have been criticized for effectively creating a customs border between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom, weakening the region’s links to Britain.
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Ireland's central bank governor urged lawmakers on Wednesday to ban the advertising of crypto assets targetted at young adults, likening crypto not linked to any underlying assets to a Ponzi scheme, Reuters reported. A long-time critic of crypto assets, Gabriel Makhlouf said that while they presented minimal financial stability risk for now, the Irish regulator was very concerned about the impact on retail customers. "There's a reasonable number of young adults who have put their money into crypto and there is an uncomfortable level of advertising that is targeted at that cohort.
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Up to 100 Irish businesses are tipped for a new insolvency regime this year, according to Baker Tilly, the Independent reported. Demand for the Small Company Administrative Rescue Process (SCARP) has accelerated so far this year, with six companies exiting the process in the past week alone. The process was introduced in December 2021 and provides a simplified restructuring mechanism for small companies facing financial distress. There are 23 now commenced,” Baker Tilly corporate restructuring director Dessie Morrow told the Irish Independent.
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Britain and the European Union have not yet entered a more intense phase of negotiations - the so-called negotiating "tunnel" - in their talks to amend post-Brexit trade rules for Northern Ireland, Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar said, Reuters reported. Bloomberg reported on Thursday that the two sides are preparing to enter the more intense phase of the long-standing negotiations as soon as next week.
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More than 1,000 firms could go bust this year if the economic downturn worsens, racking up combined losses of €4bn, according to PwC’s latest insolvency barometer, the Independent reported. Construction, real estate, hospitality and arts businesses are the most at risk, the consulting firm said. A total of 527 companies went bust last year, 39pc up on 2021, when insolvencies were artificially lowered due to government supports. Irish firms that failed in 2022 owed €1.8bn between them, with the average debt per small- or medium-sized firm amounting to around €2m.
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Johnny Ronan’s property group this month sold its Paris property for €24.5 million to help pay down the group’s debt, the Irish Times reported. Consolidated accounts filed by Ronan’s Ardquade Ltd. also reveal that this year Ronan also advanced a loan to the group that was used to repay “a substantial part” of the group’s junior debt. Nearly a year ago, the group’s senior and junior debt amounted to a combined €194.88 million.
Midlands property developer Tony Diskin has secured Irish High Court approval to escape almost €25 million in Celtic Tiger-era debts from his property development business, the Irish Times reported. Mr. Justice Alexander Owens granted Mr. Diskin a personal insolvency arrangement (PIA) – a mechanism that allows individuals to escape significant bank and other debts – which will see him return to solvency with payment of a lump sum of €30,000. Some €25,000 of this will go towards repaying a fraction of his €24.9 million in debts.
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