INSOL Europe and INSOL International join forces to deliver two online sessions.

On a bright April morning with over 100 participants, the INSOL International and INSOL Europe joint webinar began with Matthew Newman (Ogier) facilitating. Following thanks to the sponsors Ogier and HFW, Marcel Groenewegen (President, INSOL Europe) introduced Professor Ignacio Tirado (Secretary-General, UNIDROIT) who gave the keynote address. Speaking of the latest UNIDROIT initiative, Professor Tirado outlined its importance, especially given the need to develop legislative guidance and international best practices in relation to digital assets. This was followed by a panel, moderated by Dávid Oršula (bnt attorneys), which saw Lee Pascoe (Barrister, Melbourne) and Ilya Kokorin (Leiden University) looking at issues of recovery of crypto-assets in insolvency proceedings.

The afternoon session saw Eric Levenstein (Werksman Attorneys) putting questions to the keynote speaker Kathutshelo “K2” Mapasa (CEO, Basil Read Construction), whose construction company has been in business rescue proceedings since 2018. A general lack of DIP-financing is seen as the biggest difficulty facing rescue together with the need to anticipate the likelihood of distress. The second panel, helmed by Mahesh Uttamchandani (IFC World Bank) saw panel members, including Lynn P. Harrison III (Dentons), Sonya van der Graaff (Avonhurst) and Torsten Braner (Taylor Wessing), exploring the mixed economic outcomes for businesses in the pandemic, which has impacted on business sectors very differently. Moreover, prompted by the need to ensure sustainability, legislative measures in many jurisdictions have been introduced, some hurriedly. Overall, the pandemic has offered an opportunity to rethink business models and the workings of insolvency.

Short excerpts from the seminar and details of how to access the full recordings can be viewed on our website.

A full report by Myriam Mailly (Technical Officer) and Paul Omar (Technical Research Coordinator) will be published in the Summer edition of Eurofenix.

Registration now open

INSOL Europe's Academic Forum online lecture by esteemed Professor N. Bermejo, on the topic of "Public Creditors in Preventive Restructuring Frameworks: Considerations in the light of the Pandemic Crisis", to be held on 20 May 2021, is now only 3 weeks away!

Nuria Bermejo is Professor on Commercial Law (“Profesora Titular”) at Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (Spain) since 2008. From March 2008 to October 2015, she was Legal Secretary (“Référendaire”) at the EU General Court (Luxembourg). She has lectured in other Spanish universities, as well as in European higher education institutions and South-American universities. Further details about Professor N. Bermejo can be found on our website.

The lecture will be free for INSOL Europe Academic members, €25.00 for all other members and €50.00 for non-members. Visit our website to register or contact Event Manager Harriet Taylor for further details.

CERIL proposes a concise reference work for identifying annex actions under Article 6(1) of the European Insolvency Regulation 2015 (CERIL Statement and Report 2021-1)

Initiated and chaired by Prof. Stephan Madaus (Martin Luther University, Germany) and Prof. em. Bob Wessels (Leiden University, the Netherlands), a CERIL Working Party conducted a survey on issues of international jurisdiction for individual legal cross-border actions that ‘derive directly from public collective insolvency proceedings and are closely linked with them’. To resolve uncertainty on these actions, conveniently called ‘annex actions’, CERIL proposes a concise reference work to classify and distinguish between annex actions and non-annex actions.
 
In summary, the study found three types of annex action:
 
    (a) clear annex actions,
    (b) clear non-annex actions and
    (c) actions with relevant uncertainty about their classification.
 
The Report sets out in detail the categorisation in (a) and (b). Furthermore, the Report gives ample thought to the last category, under (c). This includes (i) actions brought by the insolvency practitioner in relation to the assumption or the termination of executory contracts, (ii) actions brought by an unsecured creditor against the debtor, also referred to as ‘action seeking a declaratory relief’, (iii) actions brought by secured creditors, (iv) actions concerning the return of property held by the debtor, and (v) action brought by the reinstated debtor after the termination of insolvency proceedings.
 
As a consequence, to overcome the existing level of uncertainty with time-consuming and costly disputes in civil proceedings, especially their characterisation as ‘annex action’, CERIL encourages litigators and courts to use the concise reference work as set out in its Report.
 
The CERIL Statement and Report 2020-1 can be downloaded here.