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The dismantling of bankrupt trucker Yellow is shaping up as a bidding battle over real estate as trucking companies look to capitalize on a rare chance to snap up coveted freight terminals across North America, the Wall Street Journal reported. Old Dominion Freight Line last week agreed to buy Yellow’s network of about 170 truck terminals for $1.5 billion, surpassing an earlier offer of $1.3 billion from rival trucker Estes Express Lines. Both bids exceeded the value Yellow placed on its real estate in its bankruptcy filing, signaling the high value trucking companies place on the sites. Old Dominion Freight Line is now the stalking horse in a bankruptcy court-supervised auction that will take place on Oct. 18. That means ODFL is the front-runner but by no means the certain winner in a contest expected to draw bids from across the trucking industry and the industrial real-estate sector.

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.

Cyxtera Technologies Inc., the bankrupt data-center operator, has drawn interest for its assets from multiple parties including Brookfield Infrastructure Partners and Digital Realty Trust Inc., Bloomberg News reported. Cyxtera has been looking at a dual-track process as it seeks to wrap up its chapter 11 case. That includes weighing a sale of its business or a debt recapitalization in which lenders would take control of the firm. The company said in a news release last week that it has received multiple qualified bids, and final offers are due Aug. 18. Deliberations are fluid and there is no certainty that the parties will proceed with a final bid. Brookfield Infrastructure has been on a buying spree in the industry, with recent acquisitions of European data center firm Data4 and Compass Datacenters LLC. It also owns distressed data center Dawn Acquisitions LLC, which does business as Evoque Data Center Solutions. Prior to its June bankruptcy, the struggling data-center operator had entered into negotiations with lenders on how to tackle nearly $870 million of debt due next year. Cyxtera was formed in 2017 after CenturyLink’s data center and co-location business was combined with Medina Capital’s security and data analytics operations.

The University of Iowa has revealed plans to acquire Mercy Hospital on the heels of the organization's recent bankruptcy filing, the Iowa City Press-Citizen reported. Mercy "voluntarily" filed a bankruptcy petition, the company announced in a press release Monday morning. The 194-bed facility has served area residents since 1873. “Mercy Iowa City believes this plan is the best path forward to preserve our hospital operations,” said Tom Clancy, Chairman of the Board and CEO of Mercy Iowa City in a press release. “As we implement this plan, our dedicated Mercy Iowa City staff remain steadfast in their commitment to provide compassionate care to our community.” The State of Iowa Board of Regents will consider the university's proposed $20 million acquisition of Mercy's facilities and business operations at Tuesday morning's special session.
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The financially troubled healthcare sector will be the focus of the ABI Healthcare Program, September 18-19, 2023, in Nashville, Tenn. For more information and to register, click here.

Party City Holdco Inc. is considering splitting up its balloon manufacturing and retailing businesses as the latter charts a course out of bankruptcy, Bloomberg News reported. Party City has held confidential talks with debt holders about spinning off its Anagram unit. Anagram has a debt stack separate from its parent and didn’t follow most other Party City units into chapter 11 bankruptcy in January. But the businesses are deeply linked. Party City accounts for around 40% of Anagram’s revenue, according to a Fitch Ratings report from July. The retailer buys almost all of its balloons from Anagram, but has threatened to abandon that contract during bankruptcy. Anagram’s debt arose from a 2020 financing in which some Party City creditors exchanged their existing holdings to move closer to the prized balloon manufacturer. It was an ill-fated attempt to save Party City — which saw its sales plummet when the COVID-19 pandemic crimped social functions — from bankruptcy. Party City recently revised a key deal with some of its biggest lenders, tweaking its plan to exit chapter 11 protection after struggling to meet financial projections.

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. launched the sale of an $18.5 billion loan portfolio from Signature Bank this week, a pool of debt tied to major private equity and investing firms, Bloomberg News reported. The portfolio comprises 201 performing capital-call loans tied to firms including Starwood Capital Group, Carlyle Group Inc., Blackstone Inc., Thoma Bravo and Brookfield Asset Management Ltd., according to a person familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified citing private information. The loans for sale “consist of subscription credit facilities to private equity funds,” according to a notice from the FDIC. The FDIC declined to comment. A representative for Newmark didn’t immediately return a message seeking comment. The sale, which launched July 25, is limited to FDIC-insured depository institutions, according to the FDIC’s notice. The deadline for a bid is in September, with closing set for early October. Newmark Group Inc. is handling the sale.