Bankruptcy Blogs

The Daily Docket: Ergen Could Make Millions in LightSquared Deal

07/29/13

Dish Network Corp. Chairman Charlie Ergen stands to make hundreds of millions of dollars in profits personally if Dish’s bid for wireless telecommunications firm LightSquared succeeds, court records and people familiar with the situation say.

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A Free-Market Alternative to Modern Banking

07/29/13

Modern banking exposes our financial system to considerable risks. Government attempts to contain these risks exacerbate them. Here’s a proposed alternative: A “Depositary” that stores money for a fee without lending.

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Barclays to Unveil Capital Plans; Fed 'Doves' Best 'Hawks' on Forecasts

07/29/13

Receiving Wide Coverage ...

Targeting Barclays: The U.K. Treasury is expected to give the "cash-strapped' Serious Fraud Office £2 million in special "blockbuster" funding so that it can continue a probe into Barclays' fundraising efforts five years ago, the FT reports. "The SFO's director, David Green, negotiated a similar arrangement for the agency's sprawling investigation into Libor manipulation, in which Barclays is also a target," the paper notes. Regulators have been looking into "certain commercial arrangements"...

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The Privilege Is All Mine: What Happens To A Corporation’s Attorney-Client Privilege In Bankruptcy?

07/29/13

It’s well-established that a corporation has an attorney-client privilege and can assert it to keep communications between the corporation and its attorneys confidential. When a corporation is solvent, its officers and directors maintain the right to assert — or waive — the attorney-client privilege on behalf of the corporation, and control who has access to privileged communications.

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The Privilege Is All Mine: What Happens To A Corporation’s Attorney-Client Privilege In Bankruptcy?

07/29/13

It’s well-established that a corporation has an attorney-client privilege and can assert it to keep communications between the corporation and its attorneys confidential. When a corporation is solvent, its officers and directors maintain the right to assert — or waive — the attorney-client privilege on behalf of the corporation, and control who has access to privileged communications.

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Attorney-Client Privilege, Work Product, in Bankruptcy

07/27/13

puzzleThe U.S. Trustee comes a’knocking at your door.  it doesn’t care about no stinkin’ attorney-client privilege.  The attorney work product privilege is just so many meaningless words to it.

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France is Man Enough to Pari Passu

07/27/13

Just when you thought the world's economic leaders were a bunch of spineless, viewless appeasers who would sell their nearest and dearest to mollify the scary monsters who would eat them anyway ...  France saves the day!

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Interchange Updates: Canada, EU, and the US

07/26/13

All's Quiet on the American Front in the interchange wars.  But there has been some action to report in Canada and the EU. In Canada, the federal Competition Tribunal dismissed the suit brought by the Canadian antitrust authority against Visa and MasterCard. Only a summary of the decision is available--the ruling is under seal.

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Chapter 9 and State Law: the Dubious Applicability of the Supremacy Clause

07/26/13

Many commentators have assumed that the Supremacy Clause of the federal constitution settles the issue. I don't think it is so cut and dry. Bankruptcy always starts with inputs from "applicable non-bankruptcy law," which generally means state law. This is the basic holding in Butner v. US. Thus, whether a manufactured home is treated as personalty or realty in bankruptcy--critical for the question of whether a mortgage on the trailer can be crammed down in Chapter 13--depends on state law.

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The Future Model of Banking, Part II; GSE Reform, Part Infinity

07/26/13

A recap of the informed opinions (and the discussions they generated) on BankThink this week.

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