The court-appointed trustee overseeing the liquidation of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.'s broker-dealer business is in line for more than $4 billion in a little noticed portion part of a bankruptcy judge's ruling turning aside Lehman's bid to revisit the sale of the business to Barclays PLC, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. In U.S.

The federal government is questioning whether our neighbors to the north will be looking out for the U.S. taxpayers in a Canadian pharmaceutical company’s insolvency case, The Wall Street Journal Bankruptcy Beat blog reported. The National Institutes of Health and the Department of Health and Human Services objected last week to Angiotech Pharmaceuticals Inc.’s request to gain U.S. courts’ recognition of its case in Canada. The Vancouver drug maker sought that recognition through its Chapter 15 bankruptcy filing with the Wilmington, Del., bankruptcy court.

Struggling Laval custom drug researcher LAB Research Inc. said Monday it has been informed by a U.S. private equity firm that it has longer any interest in acquiring LAB and the company has been forced into bankruptcy by its principal lender, The Montreal Gazette reported. LAB said in a statement the directors have resigned and a receiver has been appointed. The principal lender wants to solicit or entertain offers for LAB and its modern pre-clinical testing facilities in Laval, and in Denmark and Hungary.

A bankruptcy judge granted Bahrain's Awal Bank BSC a two-week extension to control its bankruptcy case, setting up a showdown with its only U.S. creditor, HSBC Bank USA, which is seeking to have the Chapter 11 case thrown out, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. The extension Judge Allan L. Gropper of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan approved Thursday will allow Awal to make its argument to maintain control of its bankruptcy until August at the same hearing that HSBC Holdings PLC's U.S. unit will ask the judge to dismiss the case. That hearing is set for March 1.

Grounded airline Mexicana de Aviacion is in discussions with the International Air Transport Association, or IATA, to possibly rejoin key ticketing and settlement systems as the company seeks to emerge from bankruptcy proceedings, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. "They have reached out to IATA and we are currently in talks," a spokesman for the association said Tuesday.

Fraser Papers' restructuring plan, and the sale of its U.S. subsidiaries to Brookfield Asset Management, appear to be in the final stages of a painful journey that began nearly two years ago, The Canadian Press reported. Under an amended plan, worked out early this year after the original restructuring was rejected, will see Brookfield — Fraser Paper's majority shareholder — continue to have a major stake in the remaining operating assets. Fraser Papers said Tuesday its creditors will receive about US$44 million in unsecured notes issued by Twin Rivers Paper Company Inc.

Four officials of Concrete Equities, a now-defunct Calgary company that raised $118 million to buy commercial real estate, are under scrutiny as the Alberta Securities Commission tries to determine whether they misled investors, the Calgary Herald reported. Monday, lawyers for the ASC outlined the case they hope to prove, which includes investors who were promised returns of more than 600 per cent and told the investments were risk free, as well as those who weren't told of marketing commissions of between seven and 10 per cent being paid to Concrete Equities.

Big-name bidders are circling a $640 million portfolio of soured Spanish commercial-real-estate loans, the latest sign of how private-equity firms are still trying to take advantage of the property bust even as the global economy recovers, The Wall Street Journal reported. Morgan Stanley, which is handling the sale for Royal Bank of Scotland Group PLC, received a handful of initial proposals at the end of last week, a person familiar with the situation said Tuesday.

Fraser Papers got the green light to proceed with its efforts to emerge from bankruptcy protection on Tuesday after creditors approved an amended restructuring agreement, The Canadian Press reported. The insolvent paper producer said the latest restructuring plan won support from 94 per cent of voters who attended a special meeting in Toronto. Votes in support of the plan represented 75 per cent of the dollar value held by the creditors. Under the Companies' Creditors Arrangement Act, the plan needed support from two thirds of the dollar value of Fraser Paper claimants voting at the meeting.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, on a visit Monday to Latin America's biggest economy, urged Brazilian officials to help the U.S. pressure China to allow its currency to appreciate, The Wall Street Journal reported. Though officials in public shied away from specifics of any plan to coordinate calls for a stronger yuan, a person familiar with the discussions said Brazil and the U.S. may speak with a common voice on the issue in a coming meeting of the Group of 20 major economies.