Business

Your favorite judges will answer the most difficult questions fielded from ABI members in the weeks before this event and from members of the audience. Hear the judges provide their input on best practices, interesting arguments and the current state of the law.

This panel is part of our continuing series on drafting skills for bankruptcy and restructuring attorneys. The panel is intended to provide a practical “how to” discussion and analysis of drafting chapter 11 plan documents including the Disclosure Statement, the Chapter 11 Plan, Liquidating Trust Agreements, and related document. The panel will provide form documents and discuss heavily negotiated or scrutinized provisions in these documents.

This panel will provide a review and analysis of § 1129(a) and (b) confirmation standards focused on recent and hot topic areas affecting senior and junior secured creditors. Discussed will be Momentive Performance issues, including cramdown interest rates at below-market rates even when market rates exist, the extent of the subordination of senior subordinated noteholders, the enforceability of make-whole payment provisions in chapter 11 plans, and intercreditor and cramdown issues.

This panel will discuss why experts are needed for cramdown analysis and other plan-confirmation issues raised by the Supreme Court’s decision in Till, including how to identify, select, prepare and present experts on Till confirmation issues.

NO CLE Credit Available - Free Session. Join in a dialogue led by former ABI Presidents: Richardo I. Kilpatrick Kilpatrick & Associates, PC; Auburn Hills, Mich. Melissa Kibler Knoll Mesirow Financial Consulting, LLC; Chicago Michael P. Richman Hunton & Williams LLP; New York

This panel will discuss the use of your iPad and other tablets to maximize the return to your practice. The topics will include a discussion of leading apps that are available for bankruptcy attorneys and other bankruptcy case professionals.

Many companies operating in and around the energy industry have been adversely affected by the recent precipitous drop in the price of oil, a global trend that has exposed vulnerabilities in a number of industry segments and individual companies. The companies, their exposures and the complicated issues raised by their distress span the Americas. This panel will introduce the industry and recent trends, cover the ways that these companies finance themselves and operate, and discuss a number of complex multijurisdictional finance, legal, regulatory and environmental issues that will be significant in these restructurings.

This panel of Chapter 9 specialists will discuss the Chapter 9 bankruptcy process including eligibility under Chapter 9, the authority of the bankruptcy court, powers of the municipal debtor, the role of creditors, the automatic stay, issues peculiar to certain types of Chapter 9 debtors such as hospitals and cities and the recent developments in chapter 9.

The panelists will present a mock hearing during which they will adduce evidence from plaintiff and defense witnesses and make legal arguments on various topical issues that arise in a preference action. Among the matters to be discussed will be timely issues involved in preference actions, including both the new value and ordinary course of business defenses, as well as the use of state law preference actions and safe harbors.

This panel will discuss the increasingly prevalent use of receiverships under state and federal law by lenders to distressed companies as an alternative to bankruptcy. But the two schemes are not mutually exclusive, and sometimes they collide. The panel will explore the various legal and practical differences, benefits and disadvantages of receiverships vs. bankruptcy, and issues that arise when the two meet.