Southeastern Grocers LLC, the owner of the Bi-Lo and Winn-Dixie supermarket chains, won bankruptcy court approval Wednesday for procedures to close or sell about 100 stores and for a key vendor to provide easier credit terms as part of the grocer’s chapter 11 reorganization, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. Bankruptcy Judge Mary Walrath signed off on the requests as part of a prepackaged bankruptcy filed on Tuesday by the Jacksonville, Fla.-based retailer, which faced maturing debt later this year. Southeastern’s reorganization, if approved, will hand ownership to its creditors and reduce its debt by about $500 million, to roughly $700 million. Southeastern said earlier this month it reached an agreement with a creditor group holding 80 percent of its outstanding 8.625 percent/9.375 percent unsecured pay-in-kind toggle notes due September 2018. The unsecured noteholders will receive the equity in the restructured company in exchange for canceling their $522 million in claims for the notes, a court filing said. Read more.
Occupancy issues are at the heart of many significant retail cases, as detailed in the forthcoming ABI publication Retail and Office Bankruptcy: Landlord/Tenant Rights, available for pre-order at the ABI Store. https://store.abi.org/retail-and-office-bankruptcy-landlord-tenant-righ…
