Section 546(e) of the Bankruptcy Code’s “safe harbor” preventing avoidance in bankruptcy of certain securities, commodity, or forward-contract payments has long been a magnet for controversy. Several noteworthy court rulings...more
10/3/2023
/ Article III ,
Bankruptcy Code ,
Chapter 11 ,
Chapter 7 ,
Commercial Bankruptcy ,
Corporate Restructuring ,
Fraudulent Transfers ,
Safe Harbors ,
Securities Contracts ,
Sovereign Immunity ,
Standing
The court-fashioned doctrine of "equitable mootness" has frequently been applied to bar appeals of bankruptcy court orders under circumstances where reversal or modification of an order could jeopardize, for example, the...more
There is longstanding controversy concerning the validity of third-party release provisions in non-asbestos trust chapter 11 plans that limit the potential exposure of various nondebtor parties involved in the process of...more
7/28/2023
/ Bankruptcy Code ,
Bankruptcy Court ,
Bankruptcy Preferences ,
Chapter 11 ,
Chapter 13 ,
Chapter 15 ,
Chapter 7 ,
Commercial Bankruptcy ,
Consumer Bankruptcy ,
Creditors ,
Debtors ,
Restructuring ,
SCOTUS
A bankruptcy trustee's ability to avoid and recover pre-bankruptcy preferential transfers is essential to preserving or augmenting the estate for the benefit of all stakeholders. In 2019, however, the Bankruptcy Code was...more
7/28/2023
/ Affirmative Defenses ,
Avoidance ,
Bankruptcy Code ,
Bankruptcy Court ,
Bankruptcy Trustees ,
Chapter 11 ,
Chapter 7 ,
Commercial Bankruptcy ,
Debtors-in-Possession ,
Delaware ,
Due Diligence ,
Preferential Transfers
Section 363(m) of the Bankruptcy Code provides that the reversal or modification of an order approving a sale or lease of assets in bankruptcy does not affect the validity of the sale or lease to a good-faith purchaser or...more
To shield bankruptcy trustees and certain other entities from litigation arising from actions taken in their official capacity, the "Barton doctrine"—now more than a century old—provides that such litigation may be commenced...more
A handful of recent high-profile court rulings have considered whether a chapter 11 debtor is obligated to pay postpetition, pre-effective date interest ("pendency interest") to unsecured creditors to render their claims...more
One year ago, we wrote that, in early 2021, it was widely anticipated that the unprecedented pressure the COVID-19 pandemic brought to bear on the U.S. economy would lead to a boom in corporate bankruptcy filings. That boom...more
Perhaps given the relative rarity of solvent-debtor cases during the nearly 45 years since the Bankruptcy Code was enacted, a handful of recent high-profile court rulings have addressed whether a solvent chapter 11 debtor is...more
On October 14, 2022, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit issued a long-awaited ruling on whether Ultra Petroleum Corp. (“UPC”) must pay a $201 million make-whole premium to noteholders under its confirmed chapter...more
In a decision that could have significant ramifications in bankruptcy cases, a divided panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled in 2021 that the standard articulated by the U.S. Supreme Court in Taggart...more
New York Bankruptcy Court Rules That Good Faith Is Not The Gatekeeper To Chapter 15 -
Despite the absence of any explicit directive in the Bankruptcy Code, it is well understood that a debtor must file a chapter 11...more
11/10/2021
/ Bankruptcy Code ,
Bankruptcy Court ,
Chapter 11 ,
Chapter 15 ,
Chapter 7 ,
Commercial Bankruptcy ,
Corporate Restructuring ,
Creditors ,
Debtors ,
Good Faith ,
Insolvency ,
Leveraged Buyout
Whether the pre-Bankruptcy Code "solvent debtor exception" requiring the payment of postpetition interest to dissenting unsecured creditors under a chapter 11 plan survived the enactment of the Bankruptcy Code in 1978 has...more
In This Issue:
First Impressions: Third Circuit Scuttles Triangular Setoff in Bankruptcy -
In In re Orexigen Therapeutics, Inc., 990 F.3d 748 (3d Cir. 2021), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit ruled as a...more
5/27/2021
/ Bankruptcy Code ,
Bankruptcy Court ,
Chapter 11 ,
Chapter 7 ,
Commercial Bankruptcy ,
Corporate Restructuring ,
Debt Restructuring ,
Leveraged Buyout ,
Mootness ,
Mutuality ,
Safe Harbors
To encourage creditors, equity interest holders, indenture trustees, and unofficial committees to take actions that benefit a chapter 9 or chapter 11 estate, the Bankruptcy Code confers administrative expense status on claims...more
In the latest chapter of more than a decade of litigation involving efforts to recover fictitious profits paid to certain customers of Bernard Madoff's defunct brokerage firm as part of the largest Ponzi scheme in history,...more
The ability of a bankruptcy trustee or chapter 11 debtor-in-possession ("DIP") to avoid fraudulent transfers is an important tool promoting the bankruptcy policies of equality of distribution among creditors and maximizing...more
2/9/2021
/ Bankruptcy Code ,
Bankruptcy Trustees ,
Chapter 7 ,
Debtors ,
Debtors-in-Possession ,
Fraudulent Transfers ,
Internal Revenue Code (IRC) ,
IRS ,
Look-Back Measurement Period ,
Section 548 ,
Statute of Limitations ,
Tax Avoidance ,
UFTA
The ability of a bankruptcy trustee to avoid certain transfers of a debtor's property and to recover the property or its value from the transferees is an essential tool in maximizing the value of a bankruptcy estate for the...more
In Hafen v. Adams (In re Hafen), 616 B.R. 570 (B.A.P. 10th Cir. 2020), a bankruptcy appellate panel from the Tenth Circuit ("BAP") held that the bankruptcy court is the only court with subject-matter jurisdiction to decide...more
12/17/2020
/ Article III ,
Bankruptcy Appellate Panel (BAP) ,
Bankruptcy Code ,
Bankruptcy Court ,
Chapter 11 ,
Chapter 7 ,
Debtors-in-Possession ,
Exclusive Jurisdiction ,
Fraudulent Transfers ,
Standing ,
Statutory Authority ,
Subject Matter Jurisdiction
A basic tenet of bankruptcy law, premised on the legal separateness of a debtor prior to filing for bankruptcy and the estate created upon a bankruptcy filing, is that prepetition debts are generally treated differently than...more
12/14/2020
/ Administrative Expenses ,
Appeals ,
Appellate Courts ,
Bankruptcy Code ,
Bankruptcy Court ,
Chapter 7 ,
Commercial Bankruptcy ,
Corporate Taxes ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Income Taxes ,
Internal Revenue Code (IRC) ,
IRS ,
Tax Liability ,
Tax Returns
The practice of conferring "derivative standing" on official creditors' committees to assert claims on behalf of a bankruptcy estate in cases where the debtor or a bankruptcy trustee is unwilling or unable to do so is a...more
10/21/2020
/ Bankruptcy Code ,
Breach of Duty ,
Chapter 11 ,
Chapter 7 ,
Commercial Bankruptcy ,
Creditors ,
Debtors-in-Possession ,
Equitable Subordination ,
Limited Liability Company (LLC) ,
Real Party in Interest ,
Standing
The ability of a bankruptcy trustee or chapter 11 debtor-in-possession ("DIP") to sell assets of the bankruptcy estate "free and clear" of "any interest" in the property asserted by a non-debtor is an important tool designed...more
9/1/2020
/ Bankruptcy Code ,
Chapter 11 ,
Chapter 7 ,
Commercial Bankruptcy ,
Creditors ,
Debtors-in-Possession ,
Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) ,
Reorganizations ,
Section 363 ,
Successor Liability ,
Withdrawal Liability
In Taggart v. Lorenzen, 139 S. Ct. 1795 (June 3, 2019), the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a bankruptcy court may hold a creditor in civil contempt for attempting to collect on a debt that has been discharged in bankruptcy "if...more
6/2/2020
/ Appeals ,
Attorney's Fees ,
Bankruptcy Appellate Panel (BAP) ,
Bankruptcy Code § 524(a) ,
Bankruptcy Discharge Order ,
Chapter 7 ,
Civil Contempt Orders ,
Concurrent Litigation ,
Creditors ,
Dischargeable Debts ,
Injunctive Relief ,
Money Judgment ,
Reasonable Belief Test ,
Remand ,
Reversal ,
SCOTUS ,
Standard of Review ,
Statutory Violations ,
Strict Liability ,
Taggart v Lorenzen ,
Vacated
A basic tenet of bankruptcy law, premised on the legal separateness of a debtor prior to filing for bankruptcy and the estate created upon a bankruptcy filing, is that prepetition debts are generally treated differently than...more
3/2/2020
/ Administrative Expenses ,
Administrative Priority ,
Bankruptcy Code ,
Bankruptcy Court ,
Bifurcation ,
Chapter 11 ,
Chapter 7 ,
Commercial Bankruptcy ,
Congressional Intent ,
Debtors ,
Gross Receipts Tax ,
Income Taxes ,
Legislative History ,
Tax Liability
Under the "single-satisfaction rule," although a bankruptcy trustee or a chapter 11 debtor-in-possession ("DIP") may seek to avoid and recover avoidable transfers of a debtor's property from more than one transferee, the...more