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Bankruptcy Judge Threatens to Kick Trump Entertainment into Liquidation

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A federal judge is threatening to boot Trump Entertainment Resorts Inc. out of chapter 11 protection unless there’s “a firm indication” that the company’s sole casino, the Trump Taj Mahal, is going to stay open, the Wall Street Journal reported today. In a signed order, Judge Kevin Gross, who is presiding over the gambling company’s Chapter 11 reorganization effort, cited the lack of a “reasonable likelihood of rehabilitation” for Trump Entertainment, which has said it would close the Trump Taj Mahal on Dec. 12. If that happens, the Trump Taj Mahal will be the fifth Atlantic City boardwalk casino to close down this year, and Trump Entertainment will find itself in a chapter 7 bankruptcy liquidation.

Hutcheson Medical Centers Board Votes to File for Chapter 11

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Hutcheson Medical Center’s board of directors voted Wednesday night to file for chapter 11 protection, the Chattanooga Times Free Press reported today. Hutcheson has been unable to repay $20 million it borrowed from Erlanger Health System and is facing a threat of foreclosure. In January, Erlanger filed a civil lawsuit against Hutcheson, who was supposed to pay back the $20.5 million loan by Dec. 1 of last year.

GT Advanced Tech Creditors Chafe at Settlement Deal with Apple

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Creditors of GT Advanced Technologies complained in a bankruptcy court filing that the sapphire company may have gotten too little in its proposed settlement with Apple Inc. over legal claims stemming from a deal to supply sapphire screens, Reuters reported yesterday. GT Advanced's chief operating officer has said in court papers that the iPhone maker pulled a "bait and switch" to force the sapphire maker into a money-losing deal in 2013. GT Advanced shocked investors by filing for bankruptcy in October in a case that was initially shrouded in secrecy due to a confidentiality agreements with Apple. After the bankruptcy filing, Apple agreed to release GT Advanced from the deal and allow it to sell more than 2,000 sapphire furnaces located in Mesa, Arizona. The agreement needs approval by U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Henry Boroff, who has been hearing the chapter 11 case in Springfield, Mass.

Revel Casino Buyer Backs Out of Deal

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Brookfield Asset Management is dropping its plan to buy Atlantic City's Revel Hotel Casino for $110 million, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported today. The deal fell apart over how much Brookfield would have to pay in fixed costs to the owners of the $129 million utility plant next door that chills water for air-conditioning, provides hot water, and distributes electricity to the $2.4 billion Revel. The sale of Revel, which closed Sept. 2, putting more than 3,000 people of out of work, was expected to be completed by the end of this year. It was not clear when Brookfield, which intended to operate it as a casino, would have reopened it.

MMA Railway Trustee Casts Wide Net for Corporations to Pay Lac-Megantic Victims

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Robert Keach, the bankruptcy trustee in the Montreal, Maine and Atlantic Railway case, is casting a wide net in an effort to reach into deep corporate pockets to create a fund to compensate victims and help pay the enormous costs related to the Lac-Megantic rail disaster in Quebec last year, the Bangor (Maine) Daily News reported today. In September, Keach asked a bankruptcy judge to order nine international companies to turn over all documents that discuss the sale of crude oil obtained from the Bakken Foundation in North Dakota, then shipped by truck and rail into and across Canada. The motion, granted yesterday by Bankruptcy Judge Louis Kornreich, compels ConocoPhillips, Shell Trading U.S. Co., Arrow Midstream Holdings LLC, Enersrco Energy LLC, InCorr Energy Group LLC, Marathon Oil Corp., Oasis Petroleum Inc. and QEP Resources Inc. to turn documents over to the trustee. Keach has asked for any and all communications between the companies to and from the World Services group that owned the oil that was being shipped when the train crashed. Those companies include World Fuel Services Corp.; World Fuel Services Inc.; Western Petroleum Co.; World Fuel Services, Canada, Inc.; and Petroleum Transport Solution Inc. Western Petroleum leased the train cars.

Monarch Alternative Capital LP Said to End Talks on RadioShack Loan

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Monarch Alternative Capital LP abandoned negotiations to take over a $140 million loan to RadioShack Corp. as the electronics retailer struggled to reach a deal with lenders on a turnaround plan, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. Monarch, run by Michael Weinstock, backed out of talks it was leading with two other hedge funds to acquire the asset-backed senior loan and renegotiate the terms. The company continues to talk with the other funds and with other potential lenders. RadioShack is seeking to refinance the debt to loosen terms that may restrict the amount it can borrow under the loan in March. That would give the company time to implement a turnaround plan and avoid a cash crunch that management said in a Sept. 11 regulatory filing may lead to bankruptcy. The loan is part of a $585 million funding package arranged last month by RadioShack’s largest shareholder, Standard General LP, that gave the retailer enough cash to operate through the holiday season. Any deal to refinance the debt will be contingent on whether a key RadioShack lender, Salus Capital LLC, agrees to a company plan to close underperforming stores, one of the people said. Salus owns part of a $250 million, second-lien loan.

Falcone Wont Give Up on 2.4 Billion LightSquared Claim

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Billionaire investor Philip Falcone’s Harbinger Capital Partners LLC is appealing a bankruptcy court ruling that derailed his proposal to reorganize LightSquared by canceling a $2.4 billion claim by a group of competing creditors and splitting the company in two, Bloomberg News reported on Friday. When Falcone’s effort failed, creditors including Dish Network Corp. Chairman Charles Ergen reached a deal on a new chapter 11 proposal that would give Ergen 60 percent of the equity in a reorganized LightSquared. Harbinger, LightSquared’s current controlling shareholder, filed a notice of appeal yesterday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan, indicating a district court judge in New York will be asked to review the Oct. 30 decision. LightSquared, based in Reston, Va., has been in bankruptcy for more than two years as the company and its lead creditors argue over the best way to reorganize. The company previously narrowed three plans to one, only to be rebuffed by the bankruptcy judge. The new Ergen-led deal, which also gives equity to lender JPMorgan Chase & Co., was the result of all-day mediation on Oct. 31 with a federal judge in Manhattan, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Shelley Chapman said at a Nov. 3 hearing.

Trump Taj Mahal Sees Dec. 12 Closing Creditor Panel Pushes Own Plan

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Trump Entertainment Resorts said that it expects to close down the Trump Taj Mahal resort/casino in Atlantic City, N.J., by Dec. 12, according to an amended disclosure statement filed in the bankruptcy court overseeing the company’s chapter 11 case, Forbes.com reported yesterday. Separately, the unsecured creditors’ committee in the case has filed a motion on Nov. 14 seeking to terminate the company’s exclusive period to file a reorganization plan so that the panel could file its own plan for the company. The committee’s plan would transfer the collateral securing the company’s first-lien debt to the company’s first-lien lender, (a lender controlled by Carl Icahn), pay administrative and priority claims out of the company’s $30 million of cash on hand, and transfer the company’s remaining assets (including excess cash and causes of action) to a liquidating trust for distribution to unsecured creditors (which would include Icahn’s first-lien deficiency claim).

Bahrains Arcapita Raises 100 Million after Exiting Chapter 11

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Bahrain’s Arcapita Bank BSC has raised $100 million from shareholders to fund a return to dealmaking a year after it emerged from bankruptcy, Bloomberg News reported today. The new equity will be used to fund Shariah-compliant private equity and real estate investments in Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman and Kuwait, the bank said today. Arcapita will also look at U.S., Asian and European investments at a later stage, it said. Arcapita emerged from bankruptcy in September 2013 after securing a $350 million loan from Goldman Sachs Group Inc. The bank filed for bankruptcy in March 2012 after negotiations with creditors over a $1.1 billion syndicated loan failed. Under the terms of its debt restructuring, a new company called RA Holding Corp. was created to manage Arcapita’s $3 billion of assets. Arcapita earned $10.1 million in the fiscal year ended June, mostly from fees for managing RA on behalf of creditors.

Judge to Open Files Supporting Garlock Asbestos Fraud Claims This Week

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A long-secret trove of court filings that bankrupt gasket maker Garlock Sealing Technologies says illustrates a pattern of fraud in asbestos litigation is expected to be opened to public view this week, possibly as soon as today, Forbes.com reported on Friday. The files, Garlock says, will show how plaintiff lawyers withheld evidence their clients were exposed to multiple asbestos products in order to extract higher settlements and court verdicts from Garlock. In one case that generated a $37 million verdict in California, Garlock says, a lawyer with prominent Dallas asbestos firm Waters & Kraus flatly denied exposure to dangerous insulation that his client had already admitted, under penalty of perjury, in another proceeding. The records in racketeering lawsuits Garlock filed against several asbestos law firms are to be unsealed after a fierce battle by plaintiff lawyers to keep them secret. In January, Bankruptcy Judge George Hodges in Charlotte, North Carolina slashed Garlock’s estimated liability for asbestos exposure from $1.4 billion to $125 million after determining that the higher estimates were based upon court cases “infected by the manipulation of exposure evidence by plaintiffs and their lawyers.”