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A bankruptcy judge on Friday expressed concern that Hanjin Shipping Co.’s efforts to cobble together a restructuring plan may be moving too quickly for U.S. creditors, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday. The South Korean shipping company hopes to file a plan of reorganization with a Korean court by Dec. 23, court papers show, about four months after it sought protection there and in the U.S. “It’s very condensed,” Bankruptcy Judge John Sherwood said on Friday at a status hearing in the company’s U.S. bankruptcy proceeding. “I’m just concerned that U.S. creditors will be asleep at the wheel, because it’s a fast process.” Once Hanjin’s restructuring plan is on file, it will then be up to the South Korean court to decide whether to accept the plan or to let the company go under. Read more. (Subscription required.) 

In related news, failed South Korean container carrier Hanjin Shipping Co. Ltd. said on Friday that cargo owners were withholding up to $80 million in payments for completed shipments, complicating the company's ability to move stranded freight, Reuters reported. Hanjin lawyers said that many cargo owners had received their goods on credit but have yet to pay the shipping company. An attorney for Ashley Furniture Industries, a Wisconsin-based furniture maker, told Friday's hearing the company anticipated that costs related to Hanjin's failure would eventually exceed what it owed for past shipments. Like many retailers and other cargo owners, Ashley has been stuck paying to get its cargo from the dockside, even though Hanjin had been paid to deliver it to an inland destination. In addition, many retailers and other cargo owners have complained they have been stuck with empty Hanjin containers that ports have been unwilling to take back. Read more.

South Korea’s Hanjin Shipping Co., one of the world’s largest container shipping companies, has filed for bankruptcy protection in the U.S. to protect its vessels from being seized by creditors, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday. Hanjin filed for protection under chapter 15 of the Bankruptcy Code on Friday, days after the company sought protection in South Korea on Wednesday. Hanjin is currently the largest shipping company in Korea, operating approximately 60 regular lines world-wide, with 140 container or bulk vessels, court papers said. It is ranked as the world’s ninth largest container shipping company, transporting over 100 million tons of cargo a year. Its failure would be the largest container-shipping failure in history, dwarfing all previous carrier bankruptcies. Since Hanjin called in the bankruptcy lawyer, the refusal of ports to handle its cargo has stranded 45 ships at sea, according to the company, and more than half a million containers. Read more. (Subscription required.) 

Cover all aspects of the UNCITRAL Model Law on Cross-Border Insolvency as well as chapter 15 of the Bankruptcy Code with ABI’s Chapter 15 for Foreign Debtors. 

Bankruptcy Judge A. Benjamin Goldgar said yesterday that Caesars Entertainment Corp. is unlikely to get protection from bondholder lawsuits that would last as long as its insolvent operating company is in bankruptcy, Bloomberg News reported. Judge Goldgar today will decide whether to extend a halt on lawsuits in New York and Delaware, and if so, for how long. Goldgar made it clear yesterday that he would not give Caesars a lawsuit shield that lasts until after Caesars Entertainment Operating Co. wins approval of its reorganization plan, which can’t happen until next year at the earliest. “I’ve said that isn’t going to happen,” Goldgar said yesterday near the end of a three-day hearing on possibly halting bondholder lawsuits that could impose $11.4 billion in judgments on the parent company. The lawsuits are the biggest obstacle left to getting Caesars’ main operating unit out of bankruptcy. Bondholders want to use the suits, which a court examiner found have a good chance of succeeding, to boost their recoveries to more than the 34 percent offered by CEOC.