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Valuation has become a contentious issue in the chapter 11 case of Horsehead Holding as some shareholders are alleging that the company’s assets are actually worth more than the company contends, the New York Times reported on Saturday. The company listed $421 million in secured and unsecured debt obligations in its February bankruptcy filing. Like many companies in the commodities business, Horsehead has stumbled. Spot prices for zinc and nickel swooned in 2015, and a new zinc plant it built in Mooresboro, N.C., encountered production problems. Still, metals prices have rebounded significantly since the company filed for bankruptcy. And some Horsehead shareholders contend the company is lowballing the value of its assets to let leading creditors gain control of it at a bargain price. The decline in Horsehead’s assets has certainly been precipitous. Just before the February filing, its assets were valued at $1 billion. Six months later, Horsehead’s financial adviser estimated that the company’s assets were worth about one-third of that. Diane Lourdes Dick, an associate professor of law at Seattle University Law School, said the Horsehead case highlighted a flaw in the bankruptcy process. “What we have here are equity owners that are functionally shut out of the process, and that provides the opportunity for exploitation by other stakeholders,” she said. “It is yet another example of the unique challenges that equity holders face when the company they’ve invested in is in chapter 11.” Read more.

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A bankruptcy judge said Primorsk International Shipping Ltd.’s creditors can vote on the oil shipper’s liquidation plan, which divvies up the proceeds from the sale of its fleet, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Primorsk sold its fleet of nine double-hulled, ice-class tankers to SCF Tankers Ltd., an affiliate of Russia’s Sovcomflot, for $215 million after filing for bankruptcy earlier this year. The sale of the vessels — which are capable of transporting crude oil in extreme conditions in the Arctic and the Russian Far East — followed an auction held in London in June. Bankruptcy Judge Martin Glenn signed off on Primorsk’s plan disclosure document at a hearing earlier this week. Proceeds from the sale won’t be enough to fully repay senior lenders, a group of banks that include BNP Paribas SA and Nordea Bank Norge ASA affiliate of investment firm Oaktree Capital, owed about $262 million.

Former professional wrestler Hulk Hogan, whose real name is Terry G. Bollea, helped to put a stop to Gawker Media LLC founder Nick Denton’s bid to lease his downtown Manhattan loft, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Bollea had taken issue with Denton’s bid to rent the loft for $12,500 a month for at least a year, saying that wouldn’t be enough to cover condominium expenses. A bankruptcy judge on Wednesday sided with Bollea and denied Denton’s request to lease the condominium, which is valued at $4.25 million. In objecting to the Gawker founder’s request, a lawyer for Bollea said in a court filing “it is quite understandable that [Mr. Denton] does not want to sell his former home,” but the Gawker founder hasn’t offered up justification for leasing the property. A monthly rental of $12,500 would leave Denton in the red by $97,000 a year, court papers say. The Gawker founder and his spouse have since relocated to a cheaper apartment, according to court papers.

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.

A bankruptcy judge blocked New York taxi mogul Evgeny “Gene” Freidman from abandoning 46 taxis outside the Citigroup tower in Queens after he threatened a very public surrender to the lender he has battled since 2014, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Bankruptcy Judge Carla Craig yesterday told Freidman and his lawyers, who agreed to surrender the vehicles and their medallions in a dispute over a $34 million unpaid loan, to keep them securely in his possession until further notice. Earlier this week, Freidman said that he couldn’t refinance his debt to Citibank NA and told the judge he would surrender the medallions, which give drivers of each vehicle the right to pick up street hails in Manhattan’s lucrative central business district. The surrender marks a turning point for Freidman, who put dozens of his taxi companies in bankruptcy protection on July 22, 2015, to keep Citibank officials from taking possession of the 46 taxi medallions issued by the New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission and owed by his companies. Citibank officials said Freidman’s companies missed a monthly loan payment on Dec. 1, 2014.

Top Sports Authority executives are back with demands for up to $1.5 million in bonuses to wrap up the final stages of a bankruptcy that closed hundreds of stores and cost thousands of jobs, the Wall Street Journal reported today. U.S. Trustee Andrew Vara is back, too, with a protest similar to the objection that scuttled Sports Authority’s original bonus proposal. The defunct retailer is “prioritizing insider executives above all other parties in interest, including unsecured creditors and the thousands of employees who have already lost their jobs,” Vara said. The revised bonus program for the failed Englewood, Colo., retailer and the renewed objection from Vara set the stage for round two of a battle over bonuses for top insiders in bankruptcy. Earlier this month, Judge Mary Walrath refused to sign off on a bonus package that meant up to $2.85 million in enhanced pay for four top executives, whom Sports Authority declined to name.