%1

Gas-Mart USA Inc., owner and operator of convenience stores located at Phillips 66/Conoco gas stations, has filed for chapter 11 protection, the Kansas City (Mo.) Star reported today. The petition, listing unsecured debts of nearly $14 million, was filed in affiliated cases in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in the Western District of Missouri for Gas-Mart, as well as for Aving-Rice LLC, a company based in Illinois, for Fran Transport & Oil Co. of Missouri, and for G&G Enterprises LLC of Missouri. The largest single unsecured creditor listed in the filings is GSA Trust of Littleton, Co., owed $3.8 million. The second-largest unsecured debt is to Phillips 66 Fuel for $2.7 million. The petition certifies assets of between $10 million and $50 million and estimates that funds will be available for distribution to unsecured creditors.

Customers affected by Mt Gox's insolvency have been given more time to file their online bankruptcy claims, CoinDesk.com reported yesterday. The claim process was previously due to close at the end of May. However, a document from bankruptcy trustee Nobuaki Kobayashi, released on the former exchange's webpage today, indicated the deadline has now been extended until 12pm on 29th July (Japan time). Past this new date, affected users will only be able to view their existing bankruptcy claims online or transfer these to somebody else. "Nearer the time of distribution, the bankruptcy trustee is planning to give users an opportunity to use the system again to make changes to the details of their bankruptcy claims other than increasing the amount of the bankruptcy claims that users have filed," noted the document.

Walter Energy Inc.’s most senior lenders are pushing the unprofitable coal miner to slash worker pay, reduce pension expenses and idle plants as part of a bankruptcy plan that they will present the company this week, Bloomberg News reported today. The creditors, including Apollo Global Management LLC, Blackstone Group LP’s GSO Capital Partners, Fidelity Investments and KKR & Co., are seeking the cuts in exchange for support of a restructuring plan in bankruptcy court that would grant mining unions an equity stake in the company. The lenders, which own Walter’s first-lien bonds and loans, want to take ownership of the company as part of the reorganization. The steering committee representing Walter’s creditors has shifted in the last three months. It now comprises at least six investment firms: Ares Management, Apollo, Caspian Capital Management, Fidelity, GSO and KKR.

Morris Schneider Wittstadt, an Atlanta law firm embroiled in lawsuits over more than $20 million that went missing from its accounts, filed for chapter 11 protection on Sunday, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Morris Schneider’s troubles have been playing out publicly since last year, when money was found to be missing from accounts linked to the firm’s real-estate business. The firm claims that former majority owner Nathan Hardwick tapped the firm’s accounts for his “personal use (including payments remitted directly to casinos and on account of private jets for the personal use of Hardwick, his girlfriend and family),” the firm’s executive managing partner, Mark Wittstadt, said in bankruptcy court papers. Hardwick, who was ousted from the firm last year, denied the accusations in federal court papers filed in March. “Nat Hardwick has never engaged in any illegal, unethical or improper conduct in connection with his legal work,” said Edward Garland, lawyer for the law firm’s former leader.

Auto parts maker Chassix Holdings Inc. won final court approval of its restructuring plan on Thursday, after reaching a broad settlement with its major creditors last month, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday. Bankruptcy Judge Michael Wiles said that he would sign off on the plan, following a day-long hearing in which several of Chassix’s financial professionals testified that the plan provides the best path forward for the company. The plan has the support of private-equity firm Platinum Equity Advisors, which owns Chassix, as well as holders of the company’s secured bonds and about 85 percent of its unsecured bonds. Chassix announced a couple weeks ago that it had struck a new restructuring deal supported by the majority of its creditors. Chassix’s overall strategy in bankruptcy is to convert more than $500 million in debt into equity in a reorganized company. The new deal significantly enhanced recoveries to three classes of the company’s unsecured creditors. Unsecured trade creditors are now expected to recover between 35 percent and 40 percent of the $31 million they are owed, according to court papers. Other unsecured creditors are slated to recover 10 percent.

Rare earths miner Molycorp Inc said that it received bankruptcy court approval for interim financing of $22 million to support its operations, Reuters reported on Thursday. On June 25, the only U.S. supplier of rare earths filed for chapter 11 protection along with its subsidiaries in North America, to restructure $1.7 billion of debt in its U.S. and Canadian operations. At the company's first bankruptcy hearing on June 26, the court denied the company's loan request of $44 million. The court has approved the $22 million financing only on an interim basis, and has scheduled a final hearing on the debtor-in-possession financing for July 20, 2015, Molycorp said on Thursday.

Saladworks LLC filed a liquidation plan that would pay unsecured creditors in full, less than a month after the company was bought by an affiliate of private-equity firm Centre Lane Partners, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported today. Saladworks in a Wednesday bankruptcy court filing laid out details of its distribution, which it had already said would pay the creditors in cash. The general unsecured creditors, owed between $1 million and $1.8 million, are among several creditor groups being paid off. A hearing on whether creditors can vote on the liquidation has been scheduled for Aug. 5 in Wilmington, Del.

Boomerang Tube LLC, which makes pipes and tubing for oil and natural gas companies, will soon ask creditors to vote on its plan to hand control of the company to its lenders, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported today. In court papers filed on Tuesday with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Del., Boomerang outlined a plan under which lenders would trade approximately $214 million in debt for ownership of a reorganized company as well as for $55 million in new debt. The company has already won Bankruptcy Judge Mary Walrath’s permission to begin drawing down $145 million in bankruptcy financing to fund its continued operations while in chapter 11.

Samson Resources Corp. is reviving talks with its unsecured bondholders on a restructuring plan that would enable it to stay out of bankruptcy court and preserve some value for shareholders, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. The negotiations are pitting the unsecured bondholders — led by Blackstone LP’s credit unit GSO Capital Partners LP, Oaktree Capital Group LP and Centerbridge Capital Partners — against a group of more senior creditors. Samson, a Tulsa, Oklahoma-based natural gas producer owned by KKR & Co., is running a dual-track negotiating process with the two creditor groups. The proposal by the unsecured bondholders calls for Samson to convert its debt into a combination of senior notes and equity. The new debt will be senior to the second-lien term loan, and the group also is considering investing fresh capital into the company.