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November 2024
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Dear Members
As I am I writing this, the first real autumn storm is about to hit the Netherlands, and we are definitely approaching winter. In the Netherlands we are close to ‘Sinterklaas’ that is celebrated on the 5th of December. In other countries it is also known as St. Nikolaus, an evening full of poems and surprise gifts.
The Executive and staff of INSOL Europe, in the meantime, have geared up after the successful congress in Sorrento, for the events in the forthcoming year. In this newsletter you will find the dates for the EECC congress in May, the congress in cooperation with AIJA in June and several other events.
The Strategic taskforce is working on our plan for 2030, having digested all your comments and suggestions. We are making progress and will discuss the preliminary outcomes within the Council at the beginning of next year.
We have also been in touch with INSOL International to strengthen our relationship and organizing a joint event in January 2026, possibly in Switzerland (to be confirmed). In the last month I represented INSOL Europe during an event of the Romanian member organization UNPIR Filiala Cluj, a regional conference on 25th of October. It was a great event, and hopefully we’ll see a lot of the participants in May in Bucharest.
Also, we’re starting with our Technical Committee for our Annual Congress in Vienna next year. Many of you have given us suggestions about panels and topics, but your input on this is still welcome!
Alice van der Schee
President, INSOL Europe
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Alice van der Schee
President of
INSOL Europe
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This issue is kindly
sponsored by:

DLA Piper is a global law
firm with lawyers located
in more than 40 countries
throughout the world.
www.dlapiper.com
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Take part in our 1-minute survey! |

Question: How can we help engage Younger Professionals?
As part of our ongoing research to shape our goals and strategy for the coming years, we will be asking our members a few brief questions each month on various topics.
This month our question is: How can INSOL Europe better engage with and involve younger professionals and new entrants to the industry, ensuring a sustainable future for the organization?
The survey takes just one minute, but your feedback can make a significant difference. Please click the link above to share your thoughts!
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EECC Conference 2025 - Save the Date! |

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We are pleased to announce that the Eastern European Countries' Committee Conference will return to Romania in 2025 for its 19th Annual Conference on Friday 9 May 2025. The venue for the conference will be Bucharest, with a pre-conference dinner taking place on the evening of Thursday 8 May. Further details will be published shortly.
The co-chairs of the INSOL Europe EECC, Stela Ivanova (bnt attorneys in CEE) and Georges-Louis Harang (Addleshaw Goddard (Europe), France) are currently planning the technical programme and more details will be announced when registration is due to open.
With thanks to our Main Sponsor:

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2024 ABI and INSOL Europe Joint Symposium, London |
ABI and INSOL Europe held jointly the 2024 International Insolvency and Restructuring Symposium on Monday 28 and Tuesday 29 October in London at The Biltmore Mayfair attended by 124 delegates from 17 jurisdictions. Emmanuelle Inacio, Chief Technical Officer for INSOL Europe reports.
The first INSOL Europe panel explored the “Geopolitical Impacts on the Restructuring Market”. The panel leader Frank Tschentscher (Deloitte, Germany) and his panellists Jasper Aerts (European Stability Mechanism / ESM), Stelios Fragkos (AlixPartners, UK) and David H. Conaway (Shumaker, US) identified and analysed the geopolitical risks that are affecting the business environment in the European Union, UK & US.
If geopolitical risks are difficult to define, they include potential political, economic, military, and social hazards, that arise from wars, terrorist actions, and tensions between states that disrupt the usual, peaceful conduct of international relations. More geopolitical risks are to be expected in the years to come, especially in the context of the US elections and the global climate crisis. The panel emphasized that economic uncertainty in Europe has reached record highs since the start of the Ukraine war. Moreover, geopolitical and macroeconomic shocks necessary question the limits of corporate restructuring and insolvency laws as the right tool to address its economic and financial consequences.
Over the past two decades the euro area has deepened its financial ties with countries whose foreign policies are now increasingly at odds with Europe’s own. An escalation of geopolitical tensions can trigger capital outflows from the euro area and strain its external financing. As geopolitical risks increase, financial shocks to the euro area become more frequent and intense. The euro area’s response should not, however, be isolation, as this would reinforce fragmentation. The euro area stands to lose if globalisation reverses, and global financial markets become fragmented. Financing would become more scarce and costly. Instead of decoupling, a diversification of the euro area’s global financial linkages can help mitigate financial shocks. Domestically, risk-sharing through the help of the ESM, Banking Inion, and Capital Markets Union would support the euro area’s resilience in the face of today and tomorrow’s increasing global volatility.
The second INSOL Europe panel was devoted to “The Next Wave of EU Harmonisation” and chaired by Barry Cahir (Beauchamps, Ireland). Together with his panellists Philip Janis (European Investment Bank), Simon Whiting (Insolvency Service, UK) and David H. Conaway (Shumaker, US), the panel explored the European Commission’s proposal for a directive harmonising certain aspects of insolvency law of 7 December 2022 from the perspective of the EU, UK & US.
The very divergent insolvency regimes in the EU are often mentioned as a significant obstacle to the further development of the Capital Markets Union, which is a key plan designed to further financial and economic integration in the EU. They deliver different outcomes across Member States, and in particular they have different degrees of efficiency in terms of the time it takes to liquidate a company and the value that can eventually be recovered. This proposal aims at encouraging cross border investment within the single market through targeted harmonisation of insolvency proceedings. In particular, the proposal provides for minimum set of harmonised conditions for exercising avoidance actions; strengthening asset traceability through improved access by insolvency practitioners to asset registers, including in a cross-border setting; provisions to introduce “pre-packs”; provisions on a duty of directors to timely file for insolvency to avoid potential asset value losses for creditors; simplified liquidation procedure for insolvent microenterprises; requirements for improving the representation of creditors’ interests in the proceedings through creditors’ committees and enhanced transparency for creditors on the key features of national insolvency regimes.
There are doubts whether the proposals can fulfil the expectation of closing gaps in the capital markets union as a harmonised definition of insolvency and ranking of claims are missing. As regards harmonisation of insolvency law in the US, the Bankruptcy Code is a US federal law which applies in a uniform manner in every US state. However bankruptcy local rules of procedure and Practices vary greatly in different states/jurisdictions… Within the UK, there is not perfect harmonisation either which can be explained by the four Insolvency Services…
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INSIDE Story: Saving the Hungarian business through Share Deals |
Hungarian lawmakers have frequently sought to implement legislative solutions to save the economic activities of businesses in financial difficulty.
In recent years, three notable regulatory changes have been implemented in order to save such businesses:
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- disconnection pursuant to Act XCIX of 2021 on transitional rules related to emergency situations (“disconnection”; in Hungarian: “leválasztás”);
- establishment for the purpose of sale pursuant to Government Decree 129 of 2023 (IV. 17.) on emergency rules of sale in order to continue the economic activity of the debtor in the course of winding-up proceedings (“establishment for the purpose of sale”; in Hungarian: “alapításos értékesítés”); and
- spin-off pursuant to Act V of 2013 on the Civil Code (“spin-off”; in Hungarian: “leválás”).
The above-mentioned three regulatory changes provide different aspects of the transfer of the debtors’ assets in the form of share deals. In this Inside Story by Marcell Valastyán (Junior Associate, DLA Piper, Hungary), a brief analysis is provided of these three regulatory changes and their connection with each other. Read the full story and others here.
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National Insolvency Statistics Update: Italy, 2023-2024 |
Giorgio Corno and Greta Mariani of Studio Corno Avvocati report on the statistics from Italy for the first half of 2024 and last quarter of 2023, which show a clear trend to prefer non-judicial instruments (such as restructuring agreements and negotiated crisis resolution settlement) rather than the traditional insolvency proceedings (such as composition agreements).
The tendency seems to respond to the need to shorten times, reduce costs, ensure business continuity and avoid recurring to courts.
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Judicial liquidation proceedings (liquidazione giudiziale): There was a slight decrease in the use of judicial liquidation proceedings in 2023 (from 8,720 openings in 2021 to 7,685 in 2023)2. This proceeding was used by corporations (78.9%), sole proprietorships (8.8%) and partnerships (7.6%) which mostly belong to wholesale and retail (24.1%), manufacturing (17.8%) and construction (17.4%) areas.
Non-bankruptcy insolvency procedures: There was a sharp decline in the use of composition agreement (concordato preventivo) (from 1,067 openings in 2021 to 678 in 2023). Corporations (87.5%) and partnerships (6.5%) using such procedure belong to manufacturing (28.3%) and construction (17.3%) areas.
Also the use of compulsory administrative liquidation (liquidazione coatta amministrativa) registered a significant reduction (from 372 in 2021 to 222 in 2023). Most enterprises (97.3%) that activated such institute are cooperatives, consortia and companies operating mainly in the construction (16.9%) and in the health and social welfare sector (15.5%).
Restructuring agreements (accordi di ristrutturazione dei debiti) (with 335 openings) and negotiated crisis resolution settlement (composizione negoziata della crisi) (with almost 600 applications submitted in 2023 and more than 470 in 1q2024) registered good numbers. Most companies using negotiated crisis resolution settlement are corporations (80.3%) and belong to sectors of manufacturing (24%), wholesale and retail (20.5%) and construction (12.8%); the ones using restructuring agreements are corporations (81.5%) belonging to real estate (19.9%) and construction (18.2%) areas.
The use of the simplified composition agreement (concordato semplificato), which can only be activated after unsuccessful attempts at negotiated crisis resolution settlement, was not particularly high (70 applications in 2023).
Most voluntary liquidation procedures (liquidazione volontaria) opened in 2q2023 concern corporations that carry out their activities in construction (33%), industry (22.8%) and services (26.2%) sectors. There was an increase in the use of such procedures, especially in norther Italy (comparing 2q2022 to 2q2023: from 1,335 to 1,625 in northeast; from 2,170 to 2,835 in northwest; from 2,249 to 2,865 in the middle; from 2,528 to 3,121 in the south).
Further statistics from Italy and other jurisdictions can be found on our website here.
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Academic future in safe hands at fifth YANIL Workship in Naples |

Presenters of the research workshop with the YANIL board
On 1 and 2 October 2024, the Younger Academics Network on Insolvency Law (YANIL) organised its annual Research Workshop for the fifth time. YANIL was hosted by the University of Napoli Federico II, where the research of 11 younger academics was extensively discussed by some 30 attendees.
The presentations touched on a broad variety of topics, primarily in the field of restructuring and insolvency law, but also bordering with company law, private international law and contract law. The presenters included Arwin Tavakolnia (University of Amsterdam); Francesco Marotta (University of Padua); Diogo Pessoa Marques Cardoso (Portuguese Catholic University); Joël Lozeman (Leiden University); Hosna Sheikhattar (Leiden University); Seyed Milad Mahmood Kashani (University of Naples Federico II); Bodine Kramer (University of Amsterdam); Stefano Brighenti (University of Padua) and Lana Gotvan (University of Ljubljana).
The workshop also included animated poster presentations by Jaime Vázquez García (Universidad Autónoma de Madrid) and Samuel Biresaw (University of New England). The workshop fostered lively discussions with peers and some more experienced academics on research design, methodology and, naturally, interim research findings. Moreover, it successfully brought together a diverse group of early career academics from across Europe and beyond, including Samuel Biresaw, who joined us all the way from Australia.
The workshop also marked a change for YANIL’s board. After having served for several years as Chair, Gert-Jan Boon’s term came to an end. During the workshop, handover took place to Giulia Ballerini. Emilie Ghio (University of Edinburgh) also stepped down from the board, at the end of her term, being replaced by Defne Tasman (University of Antwerp). The workshop, organised by the YANIL board, was made possible with the kind support of the Foundation Bob Wessels Insolvency Law Collection.
YANIL is a branch of the INSOL Europe Academic Forum which brings together postgraduate students, PhD candidates, early career academics and young professionals with an interest in academic research in the field of insolvency law. More than 10 years after its establishment, YANIL has now grown to include over 100 members from different jurisdictions, in Europe and beyond. By participating in YANIL, younger academics will benefit from access to a wide range of sources which can be useful for their research, as well as network with other young researchers from around the globe. YANIL members are research active and strive to encourage and assist in the development of research initiatives in the insolvency field.
The group is chaired by Dr Giulia Ballerini, assistant professor at the University of Padua, Italy.
Visit their website for further information.
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Forthcoming Events in 2025 - Save the Dates! |
As we look ahead to 2025, we are already working on our next series of high-profile events, presenting many opportunities for businesses, industries, and professionals to connect, innovate, and grow. The year will offer numerous occasions for networking, thought leadership, and market expansion. Here’s a preview of the key INSOL Europe events that will drive business opportunities and shape trends in 2025.
- 24 January 2025, Pravo Justice Online Seminar, tbc
- 8-9 May 2025, EECC Conference, Bucharest, Romania
- 12-14 June 2025, AIJA/INSOL Europe Young Members Group (YMG) Joint Conference, Girona, Spain
- 3 July 2025, Joint Conference with R3
- 7-8 October 2025, Academic Forum Conference, Vienna, Austria
- 9-12 October 2025, Annual Congress, Vienna, Austria
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Visit our website for more events to be added as they are confirmed.
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We welcome feedback, news and story ideas for future newsletters.
Please send your suggestions to Paul Newson, CEO & Communications Manager,
email: paulnewson@insol-europe.org.
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Disclaimer: This newsletter is sent to members of INSOL Europe. No responsibility legal or otherwise is accepted by INSOL Europe for any errors, omissions or otherwise. The opinions expressed in the articles that appear are not necessarily shared by any representative of INSOL Europe. |
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