Months after a trust fund established as part of Eastman Kodak Co.'s bankruptcy sued hundreds of businesses around the planet, including a slew in the Rochester, N.Y., region, a growing number of those suits have been settled or dropped, the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle reported today. The Kodak General Unsecured Creditors Trust filed a mountain of suits — roughly 750 — in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in January, seeking to claw back potentially hundreds of millions of dollars Kodak spent in the weeks prior to it filing for Chapter 11. About a third of the cases have been settled or dropped, according to U.S. Bankruptcy Court filings. The court documents give no details on the settlements. In Kodak's case, the trust — set up by the bankruptcy court — apparently is suing pretty much everyone who received a payment from Kodak in the 90 days leading up to its filing for bankruptcy, looking for "preferential payments." Any money the trust raises is to go to the unsecured creditors who were left with unpaid bills and invoices when Kodak filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy in January 2012.
