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Arch Coal Inc. has tapped restructuring advisers to explore ways to decrease its multibillion-dollar debt load as a deep coal-market slump continues to weigh on the mining company and its rivals, the Wall Street Journal reported today. The St. Louis company is working with lawyers at Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP and financial advisers at Blackstone Group LP. Arch isn’t planning a broad restructuring of its debt load through bankruptcy, but is instead looking to trim its debt through deals with bondholder groups. Arch is in talks with holders of its bonds due in 2020, and one potential option is for the company to swap the bonds for new, higher-ranking debt. The bondholders, advised by investment bank Moelis & Co., include Blackstone’s credit arm, GSO Capital Partners; and hedge fund Hutchin Hill Capital LP.

Patriot Coal Corp. has selected Blackhawk Mining LLC as the potential buyer for its assets in bankruptcy court, Bloomberg News reported on Friday. Lexington, Ky.-based Blackhawk will be the stalking-horse bidder in an auction to set a benchmark price for most of Patriot’s assets. Patriot, which filed for chapter 11 protection last week for the second time in less than three years, is considering spinning off its union liabilities into a separate entity that won’t be purchased by Blackhawk. That structure mirrors Blackhawk’s assets purchase last year from bankrupt coal miner James River Coal Co., in which the buyer didn’t assume the pension plan.

Oil and gas companies with names like Nowitzki, Teixeira, Modano and Woodson filed for bankruptcy on May 15, the Dallas Business Journal reported today. In all, a dozen Fort Worth, Texas-based oil and gas companies filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. The names are references to Dallas Maverick Dirk Nowitzki, New York Yankee Mark Teixeira (a former Texas Ranger), former Dallas Stars player Mike Modano and former Dallas Cowboy Darren Woodson. Several other companies named after professional athletes also are listed. “They’re totally unrelated to the athletes,” said John Bonds, an attorney who is representing the companies in bankruptcy. Read more.

For further analysis of oil and gas company bankruptcy proceedings, be sure to pick up a copy of ABI’s When Gushers Go Dry: The Essentials of Oil & Gas Bankruptcy.

Timing is everything for creditors appealing the start date of the bankruptcy filing for Caesars Entertainment Corp.’s operating company in hopes of unlocking $468 million in value, Reuters reported yesterday. Caesars' unsecured creditors' committee yesterday asked a federal judge to review an April 29 ruling that Caesars is not obligated to consent to a forced bankruptcy case filed by creditors on Jan. 12. Caesars voluntarily filed for chapter 11 protection three days later, on Jan. 15. The unsecured creditors separately asked Bankruptcy Judge Benjamin Goldgar to force Caesars to consent to the Jan. 12 case because they say Caesars might have cost them money by waiting. Caesars in October granted certain stakeholders a lien on as much as $468 million in cash to earn their support for its proposed restructuring. It waited until Jan. 15 to file for bankruptcy so the lien would be outside a statutory 90-day window to challenge certain pre-bankruptcy payments, the unsecured creditors argue. The unsecured creditors want to bring the case back within that window by enforcing the Jan. 12 filing, as invalidating the lien would free up the money for other creditors.

Eastpoint 10 Cinemas in Dundalk, Md., has filed for chapter 11 protection after defaulting on its lease at Eastpoint Center, the Baltimore Business Journal reported on Saturday. National Real Estate Management Corp., the landlord for the 51,505-square-foot theater complex, sued Baltimore Eastpoint 10 Movies in April for allegedly failing to pay rent. On May 4, the Baltimore County District Court ordered the theater operator to pay the $50,926.42 in owed rent plus attorneys’ fees of $6,000. Those funds were due May 8, when the theater operator filed for bankruptcy to avoid eviction.

Ocwen Financial Corp. disclosed today that it is negotiating with lenders to extend and refinance some of its debt, the Wall Street Journal reported today. In a regulatory filing, the embattled mortgage-servicing company said that it is looking to renew, replace or extend debt arrangements that mature or begin amortization this year. Ocwen said that it is also considering selling and financing advance receivables. The company warned that if it is unable able to change the debt arrangements, it could face a liquidity crunch.

While shareholders are at the bottom of the pile in a corporate bankruptcy, it has been surprising to see that they have been gaining attention in a couple of important ways in recent weeks, according to a commentary by Prof. Stephen Lubben in the New York Times DealBook blog on Friday. First, in a recent opinion, Bankruptcy Judge Christopher S. Sontchi recently ruled in In re SS Body Armor I Inc. that shareholders retain their right to call a shareholders meeting to elect a new board in a bankruptcy case. Under Delaware law, a corporation is supposed to hold an annual meeting every year, but there is not really any consequence for failing to do so if nobody complains, according to Prof. Lubben. Because shareholders are routinely “out of the money” in chapter 11 cases, and as shareholders in the U.S. tend to be a dispersed lot, there is often little likelihood that they will complain too much about the lack of a meeting. The second development is a study by Diane Lourdes Dick at Seattle University School of Law that traces the real challenges shareholders face in getting an equity committee appointed or being taken seriously in general. Taken together, Prof. Lubben raises the idea that these developments might be part of an emerging new consideration of shareholders in corporate bankruptcy.

California medical supplier American Medical Technologies Inc. is preparing to leave bankruptcy protection after more than three years, the bulk of which were spent settling a $76 million billing dispute with federal health care regulators, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported today. With a two-page court order, Bankruptcy Judge Mark S. Wallace signed off on American Medical's turnaround plan on Wednesday, enabling company officials to put their debt-repayment plan into action. The plan calls for the Irvine, Calif., company to pay Medicare and Medicaid administrators a total of $35 million over the next seven years to settle accusations that the company took in money for equipment and services that weren't covered by the Medicare Act.