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Bankruptcy Judge Tamara O. Mitchell approved a deal to provide health care benefits to retired Walter Energy Inc. miners, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported today. Judge Mitchell on Friday signed off on the creation of a voluntary employees beneficiary association (VEBA) to pay the health care benefits of retired miners represented by the United Mine Workers of America, court papers show. The VEBA fills the gap left when Judge Mitchell authorized Walter to stop funding its retirees' health benefits in connection with the sale of its Alabama mines to its lenders. The lenders have agreed to contribute $25 million to the VEBA, which will be administered by the union, once the sale closes. The sale is expected to close by the end of the month.

A courtroom clash between failed supermarket operator Fresh & Easy LLC and its creditors appeared headed for mediation yesterday, but the overall direction of the company's chapter 11 case was clouded by looming legal battles with former employees, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported today. Appearing before Bankruptcy Judge Brendan Shannon, lawyers for Fresh & Easy tackled a number of roadblocks that threaten to drag out the bankruptcy proceeding and run up legal bills. The grocer's unsecured creditors are seeking greater access to information about the company's past business transactions, including the alleged transfer of at least $40 million in real-estate assets from Fresh & Easy to an affiliate of its private-equity backer Yucaipa Cos. But uncovering that information could be costly for the company, as could any future lawsuits it might trigger. Lawyers for Fresh & Easy and the judge said they hoped to avoid "bogging down" the case and to work toward a settlement that would put the dispute with unsecured creditors to rest.

Global bitcoin exchange Kraken said yesterday that significant progress has been made in the investigation into claims of creditors of bankrupt exchange MtGox, Reuters reported. MtGox Co Ltd, a Tokyo-based bitcoin exchange, was forced to file for bankruptcy in 2014 after hackers stole an estimated $650 million worth of customer bitcoins. Kraken was appointed in November of that year to assist Tokyo district court-appointed trustee Nobuaki Kobayashi in the bankruptcy investigation of missing bitcoins, receiving claims and distributing remaining assets to creditors of MtGox. Kraken said in a statement, citing the Tokyo-based trustee, that out of the 9,863 persons who filed bitcoin-only claims through the Japanese trustee or through Kraken's online service, 7,952 claimants have been approved.

Creditors squabbling over Caesars Entertainment Operating Co.’s $20 billion reorganization asked Bankruptcy Judge Benjamin Goldgar to order them into mediation and to appoint either an active or retired bankruptcy jurist to supervise, but were refused, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. “You don’t need my permission,” Goldgar said yesterday. “Just click your heels together three times and say, ‘There is no place like mediation.’” Mediation is a great idea that is months overdue, Goldgar said. But last month, the local rules that gave federal judges power to order mediation in Northern Illinois were revoked. And there is no other legal authority to justify ordering everybody to sit down and negotiate, Goldgar said. The decision appeared to surprise the dozens of lawyers and other professionals who gathered in Chicago for the hearing. All the major bondholder groups and other lenders, who have been warring since the case was filed more than a year ago, had asked Goldgar for the mediation order. Without court-ordered mediation, creditors who feel left out of the company’s current reorganization proposal will be free to refuse to negotiate.

Arch Coal Inc.'s unsecured creditors have asked a judge to pare down a requested $275 million bankruptcy loan by more than half, saying the financing is both unnecessary and too expensive, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported today. In an objection filed on Tuesday, the creditors urged Judge Charles Rendlen III to reconsider an earlier interim order approving the loan, painting it as a gift to the company's lenders, who would take home substantial fees and interest. The creditors have asked the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in St. Louis to rethink its earlier order at a hearing next week, when Arch will present the loan for final approval. In court papers filed shortly after the company sought chapter 11 protection in January, Arch said that the loan is needed to fund its operations while in bankruptcy. Arch is continuing its mining activity and customer shipments throughout the reorganization process.

Bankrupt rapper 50 Cent says the debt-repayment proposal up for review by a judge later this week would subject him to a form of modern-day indentured servitude, the Wall Street Journal’s Bankruptcy Beat blog reported yesterday. In court papers, lawyers for 50 Cent, whose real name is Curtis James Jackson III, argued the proposal would force the 40-year-old entertainer to turn over all of the money he earns to another lawyer until his more than $30 million in debt is paid. The proposal doesn’t require the lawyer, Richard M. Coan of Connecticut, to let Jackson keep a certain amount of money for basic living expenses. Jackson would get “access to food and shelter on the whims of [Mr. Coan],” his lawyers said in documents filed Monday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Hartford, Conn. “The plan violates the Thirteenth Amendment’s prohibition on involuntary servitude,” his lawyers said in a 30-page court papers.

Members of United Mine Workers of America have approved a new collective bargaining agreement with the company that plans to acquire key assets of Walter Energy Inc., the Birmingham (Ala.) Business Journal reported today. The new agreement between UMWA and Coal Acquisition Inc. represents a critical step in the bankruptcy process for Walter Energy. Coal Acquisition is comprised of Walter's senior lenders, but the company hasn't unveiled its specific plans for Walter's assets. UMWA said the agreement will provide continued employment for hundreds of miners in central Alabama, as well as the potential for about 100 more to be called back to work in the coming months. The agreement also includes $25 million in funding for retiree health benefits, allowing them to continue through 2016, when legislation to permanently fix miners’ retiree health care and pension shortfalls would be passed by Congress.

A German insolvency administrator has asked a bankruptcy court in New York to shield the U.S. assets of Maple Bank GmbH while its affairs are sorted, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Michael C. Frege, who has been appointed Maple Bank’s insolvency administrator in Germany, filed a chapter 15 bankruptcy case on Monday in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in New York. That followed a move by Canadian banking regulators to take control of Maple Bank’s assets in Canada to preserve them after an investigation in Germany found what the regulators believed to be tax-law violations, according to a statement from Canada’s Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions. Canada’s Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions took action after insolvency proceedings began in the courts of Germany.

The Diocese of Duluth, Minn., and attorneys representing child sexual abuse victims have agreed to enter mediation for victim claims, WDIO.com reported yesterday. The Diocese of Duluth filed for bankruptcy in December, saying that the move will allow them to protect assets and pay out what is due to victims. However, Judge Robert Kressel encouraged the Diocese and all parties involved to work with a mediator. Bankruptcy Judge Gregg Zive, who has experience in diocesan bankruptcy cases, is expected to be approved as mediator by Judge Kressel.

Creditors seeking to force Abengoa SA's ethanol plant into bankruptcy are now targeting the troubled Spanish energy company's other U.S. operations, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported today. Corn suppliers on Thursday filed an involuntary chapter 7 liquidation petition against Abengoa Bioenergy Co. LLC in a Kansas bankruptcy court, days after making the same move against Abengoa Bioenergy of Nebraska LLC in a Nebraska court. The latest filing is against a company that operates biofuel facilities in Colwich, Kan.; York, Neb.; and Portales, N.M., according to court papers.