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Mercy Iowa City Announces Preston Hollow as Winning Bidder in Bankruptcy Auction
Bond investors with Preston Hollow Community Capital were the highest bidders in Mercy Iowa City's bankruptcy auction. Preston Hollow Community Capital is a Dallas-based company worth billions of dollars, KWWL.com reported. Operations at the facility will be managed by American Healthcare Systems, which officials say has experience in rehabilitating clinics across the United States. Ownership of the hospital will be organized as a not-for-profit group. Chairman and CEO of Preston Hollow Community Capital Jim Thompson said, "Since making a major financial investment in Mercy Iowa City in 2018, Preston Hollow Community Capital has been committed to ensuring that Johnson County residents can continue accessing critical health care services through a community-based hospital.… The Preston Hollow team is pleased that this critical goal will be met for many years to come now that our bid to acquire the hospital has been approved.” Preston Hollow Community Capital will make "significant" capital investments in order to stabilize the hospital's operations.

Texas Distillery Whiskey Hollow Sells for $6 Million after Bankruptcy
An award-winning North Texas distillery that declared bankruptcy earlier this year has been purchased for $6 million, according to U.S. bankruptcy court records, the Dallas Morning News reported. Les Beasley, the master distiller and founder of Whiskey Hollow, received a $250,000 deposit toward the sale from the buyer, Pals WH Holdings LLC. Kevin Lange is listed as the firm’s president in an asset purchase agreement filing. He’s an Austin-based financial adviser and owner of Legacy One Financial Advisers, a wealth management firm. When the deal closes, the deposit will be applied as a credit against the $6 million purchase. Included in the purchase and sale of assets are typical elements, like the land and the facility with all its improvements. Also included in the deal, according to court documents, are machinery, vehicles, inventory, ingredients and finished goods. The filings detail the barrels by spirit age, what kind of wood the liquors aged in and the thousands of bottles in inventory.

Consent to a Sale for Less than the Mortgage Debt Doesn’t Waive a Deficiency Claim
Diamond Ditches the NHL’s Arizona Coyotes, Team Moves on to Scripps Broadcast Deal
Bankrupt regional sports network operator Diamond Sports Group is walking away from the NHL’s Arizona Coyotes and shuttering yet another channel, Bally Sports Arizona, YahooFinance.com reported. The move comes after the network’s other tenants, the NBA’s Phoenix Suns, WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury and Major League Baseball’s Arizona Diamondbacks, all broke loose from Bally Sports and set up their own local TV arrangements. Broadcaster E.W. Scripps announced yesterday that the Coyotes would broadcast 81 of their 82 regular season games via its new Scripps Sports operation on Scripps-owned ABC affilate Channel 15.2 (KNXV.2). The Stanley Cup Champion Vegas Golden Knights also entered a similar arrangement with Scripps Sports in May after fleeing now-defunct AT&T SportsNet Rocky Mountain. “The Debtors have been conducting an ongoing analysis of their rights agreement portfolio to identify those rights agreements that are burdensome and/or otherwise unnecessary for the Debtors’ go-forward business operations,” Diamond said in a motion filed on Wednesday in the Houston federal court overseeing its restructuring.

Bid of $28.5 Million Claims Luxury Ranch at Auction
The highest of two bids for the 800-acre plus Aspen Valley Ranch, which was advertised for $220 million in May 2020, came in at $28.5 million during a privately conducted virtual auction on Wednesday, according to bankruptcy court records, the Aspen Daily Ranch reported. The winning bid was placed by the lenders who initiated a foreclosure action on the ranch property in March, citing an outstanding debt of $88.2 million, an amount that has since grown past $100 million with interest. The loan was given to Charif Souki, who developed the property and pledged it as collateral. Aspen Valley Ranch, however, declared chapter 11 bankruptcy in late July, icing the lenders’ run at a foreclosure auction in Pitkin County. An auction was held nonetheless this week and conducted by Aspen Valley Ranch following months of written and oral arguments in the bankruptcy case about the terms of the auction and bidding process. As secured creditors, the lenders prevailed in the closed auction with a “credit bid,” meaning that amount would be applied to the balance owed by Souki, who led a group of investors that bought the ranch for $27 million in 2013, before it was developed into a family retreat and a neighborhood of luxury homes.

Instant Pot and Pyrex Maker Instant Brands Draws Interest From Citadel, Centre Lane
Instant Brands, the Illinois-based bankrupt maker of the Instant Pot pressure cooker and Pyrex glassware, has drawn interest for different parts of its business from parties including Centre Lane Partners and hedge fund Citadel, Bloomberg News reported. Citadel has offered to purchase loan holdings from existing lenders at around 7 cents on the dollar. It’s asking those who don’t want to sell to team up in a potential bid for certain assets, such as the housewares business. That would allow lenders to use debt they’re owed toward purchasing the company’s assets out of bankruptcy. Its subsidiary Citadel Advisors owns about $7.4 million in loans to Instant Brands on behalf of funds and accounts managed by it, according to a June court filing. It’s part of a group of lenders that own or manage roughly $258.1 million in terms loans to the kitchen goods maker. Meanwhile, private equity firm Centre Lane is considering a bid for the appliance unit, said some of the people. Deliberations are fluid and there is no certainty that the parties will proceed with a final bid.
