Commentary & Analysis on Current Events & Issues in Large & Mid-Market Chapter 11 Cases
Commentary & Analysis on Current Events & Issues in Large & Mid-Market Chapter 11 Cases
Everyone gathered last week at the meeting convened by Detroit Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr knew that the news would be dire. Nonetheless, Orr’s report on Detroit’s financial condition and his proposal for the treatment of the city’s creditors – an offer…
Continue Reading Detroit Creditors Asked to Take Haircut (at Sweeney Todd’s Barbershop)
Kevyn Orr, the emergency manager appointed by Michigan Governor Rick Snyder to try to resolve the Detroit financial crisis, has effectively replaced the Detroit mayor, former NBA legend Dave Bing. However, it is Orr who in the upcoming weeks…
Nearly nine months after it filed for protection under Chapter 9 of the Bankruptcy Code, a federal bankruptcy judge last week determined that the city of Stockton, California has satisfied the requirements of Section 109(c) of the Bankruptcy Code…
Continue Reading Now It Gets Interesting – Stockton, CA Found Eligible to Remain in Chapter 9
The battle in California municipal bankruptcies between bond investors and Calpers, the California public employee pension system, began in the Stockton Chapter 9 bankruptcy case and continues unabated in the bankruptcy case of San Bernardino. The issues at stake…
Detroit has seen signs of revival in its urban core following the near-death experiences of GM and Chrysler. Unfortunately, its municipal finances remain beaten down by the city’s long and precipitous decline over the past several decades. Labor and legacy costs, incurred…
Continue Reading Panic in Detroit? Motor City Moves Closer to Possible Chapter 9 Filing
The Olympics may be over, but a potential clash of titans is gearing up in the Chapter 9 bankruptcy case of Stockton, California. Municipal bond insurer National Public Finance Guarantee Corporation (“National”) has challenged Stockton’s eligibility to be a debtor…
Continue Reading Game On in Stockton, CA Chapter 9 Case – Bond Insurer Sets Focus on Calpers
Meredith Whitney, one of the first financial analysts to foresee the collapse of the housing market, famously predicted in December 2010 that a wave of municipal bond defaults was on the way. The wave, however, has yet to materialize, and…
Continue Reading Stockton, California Chapter 9 Filing – Another Outlier, Or Harbinger?
Opposing lawyers for Jefferson County, the debtor in the largest Chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy case ever filed, and the holders of its sewer warrants squared off last week in the ongoing fight over control of the County’s sewer system and…
Continue Reading State Legislature to Alabama’s Jefferson County: Drop Dead?
U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Thomas Bennett last month upheld the Chapter 9 bankruptcy filing of Jefferson County, Alabama, the largest municipal bankruptcy case in history. As has been widely reported, the County’s financial woes were precipitated by the disastrous funding…
The travails of Jefferson County, Alabama are well known. Ordered by a federal court to upgrade its sewer system in the late 1990’s, the project was marred by corruption, cost overruns and financing with complex derivatives that ultimately saddled the County…
