John Wick - What You Need To Know about the Corporate Transparency Act
Once Removed Episode 24: Expressing Goals and Intent for the Trust
Once Removed Episode 23: Naming Guardians for Minor Children
Digital Planning Podcast Episode: Planning for Influencers
A Primer On Trusts - A Podcast with Janathan Allen
Once Removed Episode 12: SLATs and the Case of McKim vs. McKim
Once Removed Episode 11: Spousal Lifetime Access Trusts, or SLATs
Once Removed Episode 10: Trustee Removal and Case Update on Leo Kahn Revocable Trust
Nonprofit Basics: Meeting Minutes Best Practices
Nonprofit Basics: Conflict of Interest Policies and Best Practices for Approving Insider Compensation
The Case of the Disappearing Trust
Protecting Your Estate Plan from Challenges: No-Contest Clause Explained
Estate Planning 101: The Five Most Important Clauses for Wills and Trusts
Law Brief: Alexis Gruttadauria and Rich Schoenstein Discuss Why You Need an Estate Plan
THE PAPER CHASE
Investment Management Update – Exit Strategies
Bill on Bankruptcy: US Airways Need a Merger More than AMR
Bill on Bankruptcy: Supreme Court Cases Will Have Wide Impact
Bill on Bankruptcy: Trustees Sleep Easy after High Court Ruling
Bill on Bankruptcy: ResCap Report, a Bargain at $83 Million
Disagreement regarding the interpretation of section 365(c) of the Bankruptcy Code has led to divergent rulings among the bankruptcy and federal circuit courts regarding whether a bankruptcy trustee or chapter 11 debtor can...more
Once upon a time a good way to commit oil patch theft was to back a truck up to the tank battery in the middle of the night, fill ‘er up, and drive off into the darkness. In re: Black Elk Energy Offshore Operations LLC shows...more
A chapter 7 trustee-lessee’s failure to comply with postpetition, pre-rejection lease obligations does not automatically give the landlord an administrative expense claim, as some courts fashion alternative remedies on a...more
The U.S. Supreme Court handed down three bankruptcy rulings to finish the current Term. The decisions address the validity of nonconsensual third-party releases in chapter 11 plans, the standing of insurance companies to...more
A debtor's non-exempt assets (and even the debtor's entire business) are commonly sold during the course of a bankruptcy case by the trustee or a chapter 11 debtor-in-possession ("DIP") as a means of augmenting the bankruptcy...more
The purpose of the 341 Meeting is to examine the debtor’s financial position and to confirm facts stated by the debtor in the bankruptcy filing. While creditors are not required to attend the 341 Meeting, creditors have an...more
We have previously blogged about the section 546(e) defense to a trustee’s avoidance powers under the Bankruptcy Code. A trustee has broad powers to set aside certain transfers made by debtors before bankruptcy. See 11 U.S.C....more
Joining the Eighth and Ninth Circuit Courts of Appeals, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals recently held that a debtor or trustee can sell its avoidance actions to third-party, non-estate representatives. See Briar Capital...more
What happens to funds recovered by the trustee after the final plan payment is made in a chapter 13 case? According to the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Iowa, absent a plan provision providing otherwise, those...more
One year ago, we wrote that 2022 would be remembered in the corporate bankruptcy world for the “crypto winter” that descended in November 2022 with the spectacular collapse of FTX Trading Ltd., Alameda Research, and...more
In a 2021 ruling, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit revived nearly 100 lawsuits seeking to recover fraudulent transfers made as part of the Madoff Ponzi scheme. In one of the latest chapters in that resurrected...more
A powerful tool afforded to a bankruptcy trustee or a chapter 11 debtor-in-possession ("DIP") is the power to recover pre-bankruptcy transfers that are avoidable under federal bankruptcy law (or sometimes state law) because...more
We have previously blogged about the section 546(e) defense to a trustee’s avoidance powers under the Bankruptcy Code. A trustee has broad powers to set aside certain transfers made by debtors before bankruptcy. See 11...more
Subchapter V of Chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code, which turned three earlier this year, created a more streamlined and less expensive Chapter 11 reorganization path for small business debtors. It also created a new position...more
Section 544(b)(1) of the Bankruptcy Code enables a trustee to step into the shoes of a creditor and avoid a transfer “of an interest of the debtor in property” that an unsecured creditor could avoid under applicable state...more
Continuing with our series on bankruptcy schedules, today we look at Schedule I, which is used to provide information about your income. This form provides a variety of purposes in bankruptcy cases – depending on the chapter...more
In bankruptcy, certain specified types of debts are forgiven or “discharged”, releasing the debtor from personal liability for those debts. Debt discharges are permanent, and when granted, the debtor is no longer required to...more
On January 9, the Seventh Circuit overturned its own 39-year-old precedent to find that: (1) the definition of “transfer” for purposes of section 547 of the Bankruptcy Code depends on federal, not state, law; and (2) the date...more
Third-party release provisions are a common feature of almost every chapter 11 plan in large bankruptcy cases. Despite this, there has long been a split among bankruptcy courts and Circuit Courts of Appeal on the scope and...more
This practice note discusses how a bankruptcy court may recharacterize documents that purport to create a loan transaction and determine that the transaction, despite labels, is something else—a transaction providing for a...more
For some time, bankruptcy courts wrestled over whether creditors violated the Bankruptcy Code’s automatic stay provision under 11 U.S.C. § 362(a)(3) by creditors’ passive retention of a debtor’s property once a debtor files...more
A bankruptcy court ruled that a creditor didn’t need to seek derivative standing to sue a liquidating trustee. The creditor, himself a trustee of the debtor’s employee stock-option plan, had standing to sue without prior...more
In this first part of his article, David sets the parameters for understanding U.S. bankruptcy concepts… According to the American Bankruptcy Institute, total commercial Chapter 11 filings in July 2021 decreased 62...more
Two recent judicial decisions, Sanchez Energy and Tribune Media, highlight the challenges faced by indenture trustees and their professionals in chapter 11 cases where there are no recoveries to noteholders. Federal law...more
Nearly sixty years ago, Justice Hugo Black wrote that the Bankruptcy Act of 1898 “simply does not authorize a trustee to distribute other people’s property among a bankrupt’s creditors.” Pearlman v. Reliance Ins. Co., 371...more