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A settlement could be reached within a month in one of the longest running and most expensive bankruptcies on record, a lawyer for Nortel Networks Corp.’s U.S. unit told an appeals court yesterday, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Nortel U.S. has been battling Canadian parent Nortel and British pensioners over how to divide $7.3 billion raised in the bankruptcy liquidation of the onetime telecommunications giant. A settlement would break an impasse that has lasted more than five years. Speaking at a hearing in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, James Bromley, lawyer for Nortel U.S., said that the Nortel combatants will know by Oct. 7 whether the latest in a long series of mediation efforts will produce a deal. “We don’t have resolution yet,” Bromley said. If there is no settlement by Oct. 7, Nortel Canada, Nortel U.S. and European creditors will continue the court fights that have, over the years, pushed the professional fee totals to the $2 billion mark.

Performance Sports Group Ltd, the maker of Bauer Hockey gear and Easton Sports baseball bats, has turned to an investment bank for advice on how to cope with its debt pile, Reuters reported yesterday. Performance Sports has sought the help of investment bank Centerview Partners Holdings LLC on its negotiations with its lenders. Performance Sports, which has offices in British Columbia and Exeter, N.H., lost more than half of its market value last week after it said it may default on its loans due to a delay in filing its annual report. It now has a market capitalization of $90 million. The delay in filing its annual report is the result of an internal investigation over its accounting, the company has said.