A Delaware judge said that Caesars Entertainment Corp., the casino operator struggling to restructure $18.4 billion of debt, must face trial sooner than usual on whether a receiver should take control of its main operating unit, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. The trial still won’t come before a mid-January hearing on a request by Caesars to dismiss a creditor group’s lawsuit or move it and a related case to a court in New York, Chancery Judge Sam Glasscock said yesterday. That would be around the time Caesars has considered putting its operating unit into bankruptcy, which would automatically halt the lawsuit. As the legal maneuvers proceed in Delaware, the company and its senior creditors are negotiating how to reshape Caesars Entertainment Operating Co. into separate entities, one to own property and one to manage casinos and hotels. Those talks have contemplated putting the operating company into chapter 11 on Jan. 15, according to documents released by one creditor group that had been involved in the discussions.
