Creditors opposed to Momentive Performance Materials Inc.’s bankruptcy reorganization lost a bid to keep the plan from being implemented while they challenge it, Bloomberg News reported today. U.S. District Judge Vincent Briccetti yesterday denied the creditors’ request for a stay, and also refused to let the plan opponents take their case directly to the U.S. Court of Appeals in Manhattan. This month, Apollo Global Management LLC’s Momentive Performance, a maker of silicone and quartz products, won bankruptcy court approval of a plan that cuts debt to less than $1.3 billion from about $4 billion. Yesterday’s decision is another victory for Leon Black’s Apollo, which took over the Waterford, New York-based company for $3.8 billion in 2006. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Drain had said that groups of senior creditors that originally opposed the plan weren’t allowed to change their votes at the last minute, which would have allowed them to be paid in cash rather than new debt. They and a group of low-ranking creditors, who are to get nothing under the plan, sought to keep it from being carried out while they appealed Judge Drain’s decision. Briccetti refused to put the plan on hold, saying that the challengers didn’t show a likelihood that they would succeed on their appeal. He said Judge Drain was probably correct in his treatment of the senior creditors’ claims.
