Syms Corp., the bankrupt discount clothing chain, and its Filene's Basement LLC unit won court approval to sell a Miami property for $4.35 million, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. Bankruptcy Judge Kevin J. Carey yesterday gave the company permission to sell the assets to Florida-based Independent Living Systems LLC, the initial bidder for the property. No other offers surfaced to compete with Independent Living.
Premier Holding Co.'s chapter 11 filing is the latest example of an unusual strategy, as most bank owners turn to bankruptcy only after their bank is in such poor financial shape that federal regulators take over their subsidiary bank's operations, the Wall Street Journal reported today. The approach is risky because the holding-company's bank could still be taken over by regulators at any time. Premier Bank Holding Co. filed for bankruptcy protection earlier this week after losses piled up for four years as recession-stung customers struggled to repay their loans. The chapter 11-facilitated sale of its only asset—its seven-branch Premier Bank unit—could bring in money for the bank holding company's estate that would otherwise be lost of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. took over the bank and sold it itself. Home BancShares Inc. of Arkansas, which operates the 28-location Centennial Bank, has agreed to buy Premier in a deal that will cost between $16.4 million and $21.4 million. The Premier move comes just one week after Capitol Bancorp Ltd. filed for bankruptcy protection with a similar strategy for its string of community banks that it said were "dangerously close" to failing, according to court papers.
Pfizer Inc.'s non-operating Quigley Co. unit won permission to have creditors vote on a bankruptcy plan that would bar most asbestos claims against the two companies, as a judge said that the issue of whether Pfizer bought votes will be addressed later, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. Bankruptcy Judge Stuart Bernstein yesterday approved Quigley's sixth reorganization plan draft after objections that it will not resolve whether Pfizer devised the plan in bad faith and manipulated the bankruptcy for its benefit. An issue that keeps resurfacing -- whether Pfizer’s actions are “just another attempt to buy the vote” of asbestos claimants -- will be addressed at a trial when Quigley seeks final confirmation of its plan after a vote, Judge Bernstein said.
Oil and natural gas company Tri-Valley Corp. is asking a bankruptcy court to approve rules for an auction of its assets, which it would like to hold in the next 75 days, Dow Jones DBR Small Cap reported today. The company has not yet named a lead bidder, according to court documents filed on Monday, but said that it is nevertheless confident that it will secure the interest of several bidders before going to auction. The sale must be completed by Nov. 7 in order to stay in compliance with its bankruptcy financing agreement, Tri-Valley said.
Want to learn more about oil and gas insolvencies? Be sure to pick up ABI's newest publication, When Gushers Go Dry: The Essentials of Oil & Gas Bankruptcy, in the ABI Bookstore: http://bookstore.abi.org/when-gushers-go-dry-essentials-oil-gas-bankrup…
Residential Capital LLC, the bankrupt mortgage lending unit of Ally Financial Inc, won court approval to pay $14.9 million in incentive payments to hold onto 191 key employees, Reuters reported yesterday. The company had sought to pay $10.8 million to 174 employees, which included people who work in the finance, legal, origination, technology and other operations. ResCap also sought to pay $4.1 million to 17 senior executives, not including CEO Thomas Marano.
NGP Capital Resources Co., the Houston-based fund that invests in energy producers, said that it expects its monthly royalty payments from ATP Oil & Gas Corp. will not be interrupted if ATP files for bankruptcy protection, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. The "overriding royalty interests" NGP owns are shares of proceeds from the sale of oil and natural gas in two of ATP's Gulf of Mexico oilfields. The royalties would be treated as production payments in bankruptcy court, and as such wouldn’t be halted, Scott Biar, NGP's chief financial officer, said yesterday. ATP is arranging $600 million in debtor-in-possession financing from Credit Suisse Group AG ahead of a possible bankruptcy filing.
Want to learn more about oil and gas insolvencies? Be sure to pick up ABI's newest publication, When Gushers Go Dry: The Essentials of Oil & Gas Bankruptcy, in the ABI Bookstore: http://bookstore.abi.org/when-gushers-go-dry-essentials-oil-gas-bankrup…
James Giddens, the trustee liquidating MF Global Inc., said that he planned to work with customers in a lawsuit against Jon Corzine and other former brokerage executives, helping to prosecute claims and eventually distributing any money they recovered to claimants, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. Giddens struck a "cooperation agreement" with lawyers for the plaintiffs, whom he will help assert "all possible claims and legal theories for recovery," he said. Working with them on a lawsuit already in progress in federal court in Manhattan, he said that he will not be duplicating their efforts.
A group of investors in southeastern Kentucky gas wells will pay $60,000 to assume control of the project in a deal reached with the bankruptcy estate of the company that initially owned the venture, the Associated Press reported yesterday. Bankruptcy Judge Joan Lloyd yesterday signed off on the agreement reached between Pioneer Energy and several affiliates and Mammoth Resource Partners, a Cave City, Ky.-based oil and gas company. The agreement resolves claims that the drilling business Pioneer's investors put money into scammed them with big promises and no results. Pioneer's attorney, Chip Bowles, told Judge Lloyd his clients would gladly pay the $60,000 to the bankruptcy estate to be done with Mammoth Resource Partners. Read more: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/judge-oks-deal-between-oil-182219155.html…
Want to learn more about oil and gas insolvencies? Be sure to pick up ABI's newest publication, When Gushers Go Dry: The Essentials of Oil & Gas Bankruptcy, in the ABI Bookstore: http://bookstore.abi.org/when-gushers-go-dry-essentials-oil-gas-bankrup…
The Fifth Circuit found in a decision on Friday that a U.S. Supreme Court ruling curtailing district courts' authority to award fee enhancements in fee-shifting cases does not apply to bankruptcies, Law360.com reported yesterday. “It's a very important case, it's one of the most comprehensive circuit court opinions on fee enhancements in bankruptcy, and it thoroughly reviews all of the precedent and broadly stands for the proposition that the bankruptcy courts will be given wide discretion in awarding fee enhancements, particularly where the creditors are paid in full,” said James F. Wallack of Goulston & Storrs PC, who represents CRG Partners. The decision — which affirmed a Texas bankruptcy court's $1 million fee enhancement award to CRG Partners Group LLC for its work on the restructuring of poultry producer Pilgrim's Pride Corp. — limits the application of the high court's 2010 ruling in Perdue v. Kenny A. ex rel. Winn, which U.S. Trustee William Neary had argued made the fee award improper. "There may be sound justifications for implementing a Perdue-like approach to the compensation of professionals ... but those justifications must be voiced to our en banc court, the Supreme Court or Congress," the three-judge panel wrote. "We hold that Perdue did not unequivocally, sub silentio overrule our prior precedent, and we are, therefore, bound to apply it." Click here to read the opinion: http://www.ca5.uscourts.gov/opinions/pub/11/11-10774-CV0.wpd.pdf
Jerry's Nugget Casino in Las Vegas filed for chapter 11 protection on Monday after failing to refinance a more than $3 million loan that matured last year, Dow Jones DBR Small Cap reported today. The casino listed assets and debts each in the $10 million to $50 million range in its chapter 11 filing.