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The chance that the organizer of Mavericks big wave surf contest in California could pull off a quick bankruptcy sale so the event could still take place next month is looking increasingly unlikely, the Wall Street Journal reported today. “There’s logistically no way in hell,” said Sabrina Brennan, a commissioner on the San Mateo County Harbor Commission, which issued the permit to the contest’s bankrupt organizer, Titans of Mavericks. The company and parent Cartel Management Inc., filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy on Jan. 31, right in the middle of the official window to host the Mavericks contest, one of surfing’s premier big-wave contests, in which some of the world’s best surfers face off on waves that can reach 60 feet in height. Brennan said that she doesn’t believe the event can happen this year, due to the length of time it would take a new owner to coordinate with authorities including the Coast Guard and California Highway Patrol. The surf contest is held on 48-hours’ notice when wind, weather and ocean swell conditions align for the perfect day. This year would have been the first event under Cartel’s permit, and Cartel has the permission for four more years. Owner Griffin Guess said that a lightning-fast sale, made cleaner by the bankruptcy process, could allow a buyer to hold the event this year prior to the March 31 deadline.

A federal court-appointed receiver for troubled U.S. hedge fund manager Platinum Partners has hinted that some clients may yet recover much of their assets, Reuters reported yesterday. "Though we have just initiated our review, thus far we have not observed a major shift in overall portfolio value," Bart Schwartz, chairman of Guidepost Solutions, wrote in a message posted to platinumpartnersreceiver.com last week. Guidepost is working to liquidate Platinum's investments in hard-to-sell private energy, mining and other companies after six top executives of the firm, including founder Mark Nordlicht and President Uri Landesman, were charged in December with running a $1 billion fraud. All six have pleaded not guilty. Platinum executives reported to Guidepost in September that two funds, Platinum Partners Credit Opportunities funds and the Platinum Partners Liquid Opportunity funds, had assets of $520 million and $16 million respectively, according to Schwartz's note. The new message from Schwartz said that Guidepost continues to work with a valuation expert to assess those assets, a process that will continue for several months. Read more. 

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After nearly 17 months in bankruptcy protection, Tulsa-based Samson Resources Corp. has reached a deal with its lenders and plans to emerge from chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization, the Oklahoman reported today. Samson's recovery plan was approved by 100 percent of first- and second-lien lenders and more than 99 percent of holders with unsecured claims against the company. "The plan of reorganization confirmed by the court today culminates a thoughtful and thorough restructuring process that dates back to late 2014," Samson CEO Andrew Kidd said. "It will enable us to significantly reduce our debt and create a capital structure that will pave the way for a successful future." Samson executives filed for bankruptcy protection in Sept. 16, becoming one of the first Oklahoma companies to file for bankruptcy during the recent oil and natural gas industry downturn. The company cited $4.2 billion in debt. Read more.

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Ultrapetrol (Bahamas) Ltd., owner of one of the largest shipping businesses in South America, received a judge’s permission to embark on a rapid chapter 11 that would result in an affiliate of Latin American private-equity firm Southern Cross Group acquiring most of its business, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Drain on Friday authorized Ultrapetrol to continue paying employees’ wages and business expenses after the company filed for chapter 11 protection earlier this week. Judge Drain is scheduled to consider approving Ultrapetrol’s reorganization plan, which creditors have already voted on, next month. Under the plan, Southern Cross subsidiary Sparrow Capital Investments Ltd. would acquire Ultrapetrol’s so-called river-supply business for $73 million. Proceeds would be paid out to Ultrapetrol’s creditors and outstanding bond debt would be retired, court papers say. Read more. (Subscription required.) 

The featured keynote at ABI's 2017 Annual Spring Meeting will be Spencer Abraham, former U.S. Senator and former U.S. Secretary of Energy. Click here to register! 

The $20 million sale of women’s clothier Nasty Gal Inc. to British e-tailer Boohoo.com was approved by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Central District of California, the Los Angeles Business Journal reported yesterday. The court’s approval was necessary before the deal could be closed. The transaction is expected to be finalized at the end of the month. Nasty Gal filed for bankruptcy in November after it failed to find a buyer for its struggling business. Boohoo, which wanted to buy Nasty Gal’s intellectual property and customer database to strengthen its U.S. business, filed a stalking horse bid in December. A bankruptcy auction was supposed to be held this week, but no other qualified bidders made an offer.

Investors who bet on bond insurer MBIA Insurance Corp. to default can’t collect following the collapse of a Lynn Tilton-assembled investment fund that MBIA guaranteed, according to a panel overseeing the credit-default-swap market, the Wall Street Journal reported. A committee within the International Swaps and Derivatives Association unanimously ruled on Tuesday that no failure-to-pay event occurred when one of the so-called Zohar funds Tilton created didn’t pay a scheduled $772 million debt maturity last month. MBIA was on the hook for that payment, and an unnamed market participant had asked ISDA to find that credit default swaps on the insurer had been triggered because $347 million of the Zohar debt was held by an MBIA affiliate. MBIA had acquired those notes under a side deal with another bond insurer, Assured Guaranty Corp., according to regulatory filings.

Ultra Petroleum Corp. filed a revised restructuring plan that calls for the oil and gas driller to raise $2.4 billion in bankruptcy-exit financing, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Court papers filed on Wednesday say that the proceeds of the new financing will be used to pay down $2.52 billion of senior bonds and revolver drawings in full and in cash. The proposed exit facility will include a $600 million term loan, a $400 million revolving credit facility and a $1.4 billion bridge loan, which may be converted to an unsecured term loan. Barclays Bank PLC has agreed to arrange the financing, court papers say. Ultra has asked the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Houston to review the financing agreement next week as well as its request to keep the fees associated with the facility shielded from public view. Also up for court review next week is an outline of Ultra’s restructuring plan, which the company revised to include the exit financing. Under the prior restructuring plan, filed in early December, holders of $2.52 billion in senior bonds and revolver loans would have received new notes in the same amount. Read more. (Subscription required.) 

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Compass Partners LLC won a bankruptcy auction to acquire the Big Apple Circus, setting the stage for the show’s possible return to New York City for the holiday season, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Compass Partners beat a handful of competitors at this week’s auction with a $1.3 million bid, according to court papers filed yesterday. The sale, which must be approved by a bankruptcy judge, is for Big Apple Circus’s name and most of its circus equipment. The U.S. Bankruptcy Court in New York will review Compass’s bid at a Feb. 14 hearing.

Almost three months after securing bondholder support for a prepackaged bankruptcy proceeding, Ultrapetrol Bahamas Ltd., a company that floats energy boats throughout South America, filed for chapter 11 protection on Feb. 6 in the bankruptcy court in White Plains, N.Y., American Lawyer reported. The Nassau, Bahamas-based company lists $776.58 million in assets against $565.95 million in liabilities in its bankruptcy petition. Ultrapetrol, in a tally of its 40 largest unsecured creditors, also owes money to law firms in the U.K. and Paraguay. Gateley, a British firm that in 2015 began trading publicly, is listed as being owed $311,237 by the debtor, which owes another $70,950 for legal services to Paraguay’s Palacios, Prono & Talavera. Ultrapetrol is an industrial shipping company that specializes in river barges that move petroleum products. The company, whose general counsel is Argentine lawyer Diego Alvarez-Blanco, does business in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay. In court papers, Ultrapetrol blamed a liquidity crisis caused by “deteriorating market conditions affecting the energy and natural resource industries,” as precipitating its bankruptcy case. Read more. 

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A U.S. federal appeals court dismissed an emergency appeal by opponents of Peabody Energy Corp.’s reorganization plan yesterday saying that any complaints should be lodged after the plan is confirmed by the bankruptcy court, Reuters reported. An ad hoc committee of dissenting creditors had said that a key piece of Peabody's proposal to exit chapter 11 protection violates U.S. bankruptcy law by prematurely requiring creditors to promise to support it. A bankruptcy panel of the U.S. Circuit of Appeals for the Eighth Court did not address the merits of the motion. Peabody hopes to emerge from bankruptcy in April, a year after its Chapter 11 filing with over $8 billion of debt. Its bankruptcy confirmation trial is scheduled for March 16.