The Legal Landscape of Make Whole Payments
Podcast - Credit Funds: Make-Wholes and Cramdowns: Understanding the Recent Second Circuit Momentive Decision
Bill on Bankruptcy: Make-Whole Premiums, Lehman, ResCap
Bill on Bankruptcy: Kodak Plan Bumps the Debt, Craters Stock
Bill on Bankruptcy: AMR Make-Whole Opinion Vulnerable on Appeal
Make-whole clauses (also known as prepayment premiums, call premiums or call protection) are provisions in financing transactions that require the borrower to make a specified payment to the lender if a loan is prepaid before...more
Recent decisions by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals and the Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware signal further disagreement over the treatment of “make-whole” premium payments under the Bankruptcy Code. In...more
A panel of the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit issued its long-anticipated decision in the Ultra Petroleum make-whole and post-petition interest dispute, with the majority holding that the solvent-debtor exception...more
In Short - The Situation: Courts have disagreed over whether a make-whole premium triggered by a borrower's bankruptcy filing must be disallowed as unmatured interest. They have also disputed whether the "solvent-debtor...more
MODIFICATION OF SECURED LOAN UNDER CRAMDOWN CHAPTER 11 PLAN WARRANTED DUE TO PLAN FEASIBILITY THREAT - Many recent court rulings concerning the treatment of secured creditors under a chapter 11 plan have focused on...more
Perhaps surprisingly given the rarity of such cases, a handful of high-profile court rulings recently have addressed whether a solvent chapter 11 debtor is obligated to pay postpetition, pre-effective date interest ("pendency...more
This past year was marked by extraordinary deal activity. Record breaking M&A activity drove record breaking private credit activity. Private equity M&A activity was at a substantial high, with over 8,500 deals worth $2.1...more
Takeaways - “Make-wholes” — one-off payments required if debt is prepaid or, in certain cases, otherwise accelerated — have generated litigation, with debtors contending they can continue to pay lenders under the debt’s...more
Happy 2022, everyone! It seems fitting to kick off our Make (Whole) a Minute Update series in 2022 with an alert on make-whole. On December 22, 2021, the Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware ruled in favor of the...more
Sounds like an odd combination—enforceability of make-whole and post-petition interest and patent law. It is. But relevant nonetheless. Recall that a key argument in the ongoing Ultra Petroleum dispute regarding the...more
On October 26, 2020, the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Texas issued a long-awaited ruling on whether natural gas exploration and production company Ultra Petroleum Corp. ("UPC") must pay a make-whole...more
In re Ultra Petroleum Corp. provides substantial support for the allowance of make-whole amounts pursuant to 11 U.S.C. § 502(b)(2) and that such are neither interest, unmatured interest nor the economic equivalent of...more
A recent bankruptcy case now on appeal is being closely watched for the significant economic repercussions it could have on debtors and creditors alike. On October 26, 2020, in In re Ultra Petroleum Corp., the U.S. Bankruptcy...more
On Monday, November 30, Bankruptcy Judge Marvin Isgur approved a request by Ultra Petroleum and its affiliated debtors that he certify his October 26, 2020 memorandum opinion for direct review by the United States Court of...more
The U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Texas awarded on Oct. 26, 2020, a make-whole premium and post-petition interest at the contractual default rate (as opposed to the materially lower federal judgment rate)...more
On Oct. 26, in a highly anticipated decision, the Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Texas, In re Ultra Petroleum Corp. Corp., et al., Case No. 16-32202 (Bankr. S.D. Tex. 2020), held that certain noteholders were...more
In December of last year, we wrote about the Fifth Circuit’s two decisions – Ultra I, from January 2019, and Ultra II, from December, which replaced Ultra I – regarding make-whole claims in the Ultra Petroleum bankruptcy...more
In a much-anticipated decision issued on October 26, the Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Texas awarded make-whole premiums and post-petition interest (i.e., interest accruing after the bankruptcy filing) to...more
In the July/August 2019 issue of the Business Restructuring Review, we discussed a landmark decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in In re Ultra Petroleum Corp., 913 F.3d 533(5th Cir. 2019) ("Ultra I")....more
A series of decisions over the past year — on issues such as make-whole premiums, intercreditor agreements, backstops for rights offerings and nonconsensual third-party releases — will likely have a significant impact in 2020...more
Ultra Petroleum entered bankruptcy in significant financial distress, but then – thanks to a spike in oil prices – the debtor’s fortunes changed almost literally overnight. It is generally accepted that a solvent debtor must...more
In In re Ultra Petroleum Corp., 913 F.3d 533(5th Cir. 2019), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled that a "make-whole," or "prepayment," premium owed on unsecured notes issued by a chapter 11 debtor...more
On January 17, 2019, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit issued a decision holding that “impairment” under a plan of reorganization does not arise even if a creditor is paid less than it would be entitled...more
A recent decision clarified the concept of impairment when a plan of reorganization provides for creditors to receive 100% of their allowed claims. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit held that creditors are...more
Fifth Circuit finds that make-whole premiums should be considered unmatured interest subject to disallowance under Section 502(b)(2) of the Bankruptcy Code to the extent designed to compensate for future interest payments. ...more