North America

An American-based multinational company interested in buying Grant Forest Products promises to keep the oriented strand board manufacturer operating, Northern News reported. Georgia-Pacific, owned by Koch Industries, signed an agreement to buy Grant Forest Product operations in Englehart, Earlton and South Carolina earlier this month. Grant Forest Products sought protection to restructure under the Companies' Creditors' Arrangement Act in June 2009.

The US Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware has granted protection over the US assets of a Cayman Islands exempted company in liquidation, Hedgeweek reported. The company, SIFCO5, is subject to official liquidation proceedings in the Cayman Islands, which the Bankruptcy Court found was eligible for relief under chapter 15 of the US Bankruptcy Code.

Canwest’s main creditors have won backing from a majority of the company’s lenders for a plan to restructure the newspaper publishing chain, despite opposition from Chief Executive Leonard Asper, The Toronto Sun reported. According to McMillan LLP, the legal firm representing the main creditors, 135 lenders holding nearly 77% of the company’s senior secured debt have committed their support to the plan. That “surpasses both thresholds required for the restructuring plan’s approval,” the statement said.

Vitro SAB, the Mexican glassmaker that defaulted on $1 billion of bonds last year, will delay making a second debt-restructuring offer until it receives proof that a group of creditors owns a quarter of the securities, said investor relations chief Adrian Meouchi, Bloomberg reported. A bondholder group that requested Vitro accelerate payments earlier this month failed to provide documentation showing it held at least 25 percent of the defaulted debt, Meouchi said in Jan. 25 telephone interview from Mexico City.

The Canadian Automobile Dealers Association did not fight for more than 200 members told to close by General Motors last year because its interests lay with surviving retailers in the firm's restructuring, a class-action lawsuit says. Although the lawsuit on behalf of affected dealers does not name the association as a defendant, the statement of claim says the umbrella group rejected all pleas for help about their futures, The Toronto Star reported. Trillium Motor World of Toronto sued General Motors of Canada Ltd.

Ericsson said it would cut 1,500 jobs as part of its broad restructuring plan. In addition, the vendor's profit plunged 92 percent in the fourth quarter, hit by higher restructuring costs and weaker sales, FierceWireless reported. The Swedish company reported net profit of $43.4 million in the quarter, down from $539.4 million in the year-ago quarter. Sales slumped 13 percent to $8.08 billion, down from $9.29 billion in the fourth quarter last year. Networks sales fell 16 percent in the quarter and professional services sales were flat year-over-year.

A Toronto car dealership has launched a $750-million class-action suit on behalf of more than 200 General Motors of Canada Ltd. dealers that seeks compensation for how GM handled the termination of their outlets last year, The Globe and Mail reported. The suit names the auto maker, law firm Cassels Brock & Blackwell LLP and two of the firm's lawyers.

Canadian bankruptcies rose 2.4 percent in November from a year earlier as consumers struggled to repay debts, but business bankruptcies were down sharply, suggesting the worst may be over for corporate insolvency, Reuters reported. The number of consumer bankruptcies in November rose 3.9 percent from November 2008 to 8,482, while business bankruptcies fell 21.7 percent to 396, the Office of the Superintendent of Bankruptcy Canada said in a report.

When it comes to rescuing banks, the Swedes are earning a reputation as trendsetters. First they set a standard for recovering from disaster; now they want to export their idea for how to pay for it, The New York Times reported. The country went through its own crippling banking crisis during the early 1990s, after the bursting of a domestic credit bubble. It rebounded relatively smoothly through an aggressive bailout policy built around nationalization and carving the troubled assets of banks off into a so-called bad bank.

A competing bidder has emerged for newspapers being sold by Canwest Global Communications Corp., but it is only interested in the cream of the crop, TheDeal.com reported. A trio of media executives is planning a bid for the Ottawa Citizen, Montreal Gazette and National Post, three of the leading daily newspapers owned by the bankrupt Canadian media company, according to press reports. Their selectivity may prove a problem because CanWest and its creditors have made clear that the court-monitored auction is for all or substantially all of the newspaper assets.