Bankrupt trucking company Yellow has struck a deal to sell its real estate to rival Estes Express Lines for a minimum of $1.3 billion, enough to roughly cover the loans the company accumulated before its chapter 11, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. Estes, a rival trucker that had been vying to finance Yellow’s wind-down in bankruptcy, agreed instead to serve as a stalking-horse bidder for the property assets, meaning its offer is subject to higher or better proposals at a court-supervised auction, a lawyer for Yellow said at a court hearing Thursday. Yellow also accepted an offer from Citadel and Boston hedge fund MFN Partners, the trucker’s largest shareholder, to jointly provide a $142 million bankruptcy loan, according to Yellow lawyer Allyson Smith. The loan will fund operations at the business as it winds down and sells assets. Citadel will provide $100 million of the new bankruptcy loan, while MFN will fund the rest, Smith said. Yellow will seek bankruptcy court approval for both the debtor-in-possession loan, which will fund the company’s limited operations as it winds down, and the stalking-horse bid from Estes.
