Mexican homebuilder Geo has called a meeting to present a debt restructuring plan, which it hopes will be approved by the majority of its creditors, the company said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. The meeting will be on May 6 in Mexico City, Geo said in a notice to the Mexican stock exchange. The company, whose shares have been suspended since 2013 for not reporting financial statements, entered into bankruptcy protection last April.
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Art work and office buildings are being sold by bankruptcy receivers for the Espirito Santo group of companies that collapsed last year amid fraud allegations, The Wall Street Journal reported. The 36-story Espírito Santo Plaza in Miami went on the block in April after Luxembourg officials managing the bankrupt companies hired Florida’s EXAN Capital to manage the sale. The office and condominium tower, located in Miami’s Brickell Avenue financial district, is expected to fetch at least $120 million based on market prices.
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Debt-saddled Mexican homebuilder Desarrolladora Homex said Monday that it is back in the good graces of Mexican mortgage institution Infonavit, which extends the majority of home loans in the country, The Wall Street Journal reported. Homex said it has reached an agreement with Infonavit so that the builder can once again sell homes to Infonavit borrowers.
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Canadian oil and gas producer Calvalley Petroleum Inc said on Thursday it will liquidate and restructure due to the political crisis in Yemen, where it has almost all of its operations, Reuters reported. The Calgary-based junior has a 50 percent working interest in a block in Yemen's Sayun-Masila Basin, producing 3,700 barrels per day gross, but was forced to shut down production on Tuesday as conflict in the Middle Eastern country escalated. The block is owned by the Yemeni government.
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Rizzo Bottiglieri de Carlini Armatori SpA, a marine freight transportation services provider, moved to shield its U.S. assets by filing a bankruptcy petition in Texas after seeking protection from creditors in Italy, Bloomberg News reported. The company filed under Chapter 15 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code, which would prevent creditors from taking action against the company’s U.S.-based assets while it reorganizes under Italian law. The company listed assets and debt of more than $500 million each in court documents filed Wednesday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Houston.
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Target Corp's Canadian unit said it would close the last of its 133 retail stores on April 12. The No. 2 U.S. discount chain said in January that it would exit Canada after struggling since its March 2013 launch, resulting in 17,000 employees losing their jobs and triggering a $5.1 billion quarterly charge. Target Canada's three distribution centers and Mississauga headquarters have been closed, the company said in a statement on Wednesday. "The court-approved real estate sales process is underway and is expected to be completed by the end of June 2015," Target Canada CEO Aaron Alt said.
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Exall Energy, a tiny Calgary-based oil and gas company, went into receivership last week, sunk under the weight of its $34 million in bank debt, CBC.ca reported. But, the company failed to inform shareholders, or the Alberta Securities Commission, which issued a cease trade order only on March 30. "The cease trade order was issued after ASC staff determined that Exall Energy failed to disclose, in accordance with Alberta securities laws, that it had entered into receivership and that its board of directors had resigned," the ASC said in a release.
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A second Calgary junior oilsands producer has been granted court protection from creditors as low oil prices and investor disinterest prevent recharging capital resources, The Calgary Herald reported. In a news release on its website, private Laricina Energy Ltd. reported that it has been granted Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act protection by the Court of Queen’s Bench. PricewaterhouseCoopers has been appointed monitor.
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Best Buy Canada, a unit of Best Buy Co., said it will close 66 of its Future Shop electronics stores, or roughly half, while firing 1,500 full- and part-time workers and taking a restructuring charge of as much as $280 million, Bloomberg News reported. Best Buy said in a statement released Saturday that the cost of the consolidation will reduce earnings in its 2016 fiscal year by as much as 20 cents a share. The company, which has pushed to cut costs in its U.S. operations, said it doesn’t expect the move to affect earnings in later years.
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The nasty battle between Argentina and a group of New York hedge funds has claimed another victim: Citigroup. The bank said on Tuesday that it would shut its custody business in Argentina after a federal judge in New York last week rejected its request to lift an order that prevented the bank from making interest payments to investors holding $2.3 billion in Argentine notes, the International New York Times DealBook blog reported.
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