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Tengion Inc.’s struggle to stay afloat ended today when the Winston-Salem, N.C.-based regenerative-medicine company filed for voluntary chapter 7 bankruptcy protection, the Winston-Salem Journal reported today. The company said in a regulatory filing that a bankruptcy trustee will be appointed by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court and will be in charge of liquidating the company’s assets — namely its research for kidney and bladder regeneration. Tengion cut back drastically on expenses over the past three years, including eliminating 30 of its 52 jobs in November 2011. It was not clear how many full-time employees remained. The company warned in its third-quarter earnings report Nov. 14 that it had just $5.7 million remaining in cash, and funding options appeared increasingly limited.

The closed Revel Casino Hotel in Atlantic City, N.J., wants to tap millions of dollars of new bankruptcy financing in order to pay a $26 million settlement with the city over its 2014 property taxes, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported today. The casino is asking a bankruptcy judge to approve a new $21 million increase in availability, which includes $19 million in new financing provided by Wells Fargo NA. The financing will be combined with $7 million in cash on hand to fund a $26 million settlement with Atlantic City and provide enough cash to operate until Jan. 8.

Energy Future Holdings Corp. expected to be well on its way out of bankruptcy by now when it filed for chapter 11 protection in April hoping to implement a restructuring deal struck with some of its leading creditors, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Instead of preparing for a first quarter 2015 emergence from chapter 11, however, the Texas electricity seller is still hiring professionals for a bankruptcy proceeding in which the fate of $42 billion in debt is up in the air and the chapter 11 exit sign is barely in view. Energy Future scrapped its pre-packaged restructuring pact in favor of a strategy pinned to a sale of some assets, but the sale rules are being renegotiated after a judge faulted the corporate governance process behind it. Energy Future is back at the bargaining table, or in litigation, with creditors. A fee committee set up to review the bills from court-supervised professionals counts 30 legal and financial advisory firms hired, or in the process of being hired, to work for Energy Future or its affiliates or other official bodies in chapter 11. For the first four months of the case, from April 29 through the end of August, 14 Energy Future firms ran up a combined $66 million in bills, the fee committee reported in a filing Sunday. Some were approved Monday; the rest await review.

Bankrupt cancer vaccine maker Dendreon Corp. will move ahead with a court-supervised auction of the company without a stalking-horse bidder, Reuters reported yesterday. Dendreon filed for chapter 11 protection in November after its vaccine fell short of expectations, leaving the company unable to service debt taken on to ramp up manufacturing of its key drug, Provenge. The company had said that it planned to identify a stalking-horse bidder by yesterday and hold an auction on Feb. 3 for bidders who qualify by the end of January. Multiple potential bidders were interested in Dendreon, but the company's advisers decided they did not want to tie up millions of dollars in a break-up fee, said Ken Ziman, an attorney for Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom who represents Dendreon.

Creditors of jailed real estate mogul Tim Blixseth are asking a federal judge in Washington state to find the one-time billionaire's wife in contempt of court as they try to chase down his far-flung assets, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported today. Bankruptcy trustee Brian Glasser said on Tuesday that Jessica Blixseth unlawfully transferred more than $1 million from the sale of a 156-foot luxury yacht to her mother and other entities. Some of the money was moved after U.S. District Judge Richard Jones imposed a temporary restraining order barring such transfers, Glasser said.

A bankruptcy court has allowed defunct video streaming company Aereo Inc. to auction its TV streaming technology assets, Reuters reported on Friday. The U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan ruled on Wednesday that Aereo could sell its assets, after the company reached an agreement with broadcasters over the sale process. These broadcasters include CBS Corp., Comcast Corp.'s NBC, Walt Disney Co.'s ABC and Twenty-First Century Fox Inc.'s Fox. Under the agreement, Aereo will allow the broadcasters to attend the auction of the assets and provide them a weekly update on the status of the sale process. Aereo filed for bankruptcy in November, five months after the U.S. Supreme Court said that it violated broadcasters' copyrights by capturing live and recorded programs on miniature antennas and transmitting them to subscribers for $8-$12 a month.

The back-up bidder for Revel AC Inc., now having the right to buy the shuttered Atlantic City, New Jersey, casino, wants the bankruptcy judge to cut the $95.4 million purchase price by $8.4 million in view of alleged improprieties in the auction process, Bloomberg News reported today. The purchase price for the casino’s assets should be $87 million, not the $95.4 million offered by Glenn Straub’s Polo North Country Club Inc. at an auction, Polo North said in a Dec. 24 court filing. Revel decided to proceed with a sale to Polo North after Brookfield Property Partners LP terminated a contract to buy the property for $110 million. When the bankruptcy court in Camden, N.J., approved the sale to Brookfield, the judge anointed Straub as the backup bidder to buy the project at his last offer of $95.4 million if the higher sale fell through, which it did. A hearing on the sale is scheduled for Jan. 5, when Straub wants the court to cut the purchase price.

MF Global Holdings Ltd. settled a U.S. government lawsuit, agreeing to pay $1.2 billion in restitution and a $100 million fine for customer losses tied to the company’s 2011 collapse, Bloomberg News reported on Friday. The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission sued MF Global and company officials including former Chief Executive Officer Jon Corzine last year for failing to properly supervise employees as the firm spiraled toward bankruptcy. U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero in Manhattan signed an order earlier this week approving the pact. Customers have already received most of what they are owed, according to the CFTC, the main regulator of MF Global’s failed brokerage unit, MF Global Inc. The agency claimed that MF Global Holdings is responsible for the brokerage’s failure to notify the agency of deficiencies in customer accounts, false statements and improper investments.

Bankruptcy Judge Mary Walrath yesterday tied up a remaining loose end from the 2008 collapse of Washington Mutual Bank, endorsing a $37 million settlement of the company’s claims against its former leaders, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Regulators seized the troubled subprime lender and sold it to JPMorgan Chase & Co. The settlement approved Tuesday ends some of the litigation over who was to blame for Washington Mutual’s failure including legal fights with insurance companies that balked at paying. Among other things, the settlement could free up about $18 million that has been held in reserve in the event the bankrupt company was required to cover the defense fees and costs of sued executives.

Newton, Mass.-based residential mortgage company 1st New England Mortgage Corp. has filed for chapter 7 bankruptcy, the Boston Business Journal reported today. First New England Mortgage Corp. does business as Aberdeen Mortgage, FNE Mortgage and First New England Mortgage, according to the bankruptcy filing. The mortgage company had $1.2 million in liabilities, including $124,456.28 to Company President and CEO David W. Black and $944,375.47 to Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. care of Dallas-based Locke Lord LLP, according to the bankruptcy papers.