Bankruptcy Blogs

Include lawsuits in your bankruptcy schedules!

08/17/11

You’re filing a bankruptcy case.  You’re suing someone.  You don’t have anything yet.  Your lawyers says she’s not sure your suit is worth anything.  So you don’t have to schedule it on your bankruptcy papers.  Right?  Wrong!  Big time wrong!!  Your bankruptcy schedules constitute your statement under oath that you didn’t have a claim.  It [...]

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Americans are Innumerate and Broke

08/16/11

And not just the ones I tell stories about from my clinical law teaching.  Some of our readers have written in to say that these clients of ours, these title loan and payday loan customers, are idiots or worse yet, should be institutionalized for their stupidity. Most of my stories about our clients have to do with not being able to do complex math.

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Data Insecurity Is a Systemic Threat

08/16/11

Recent bank data breaches have been so severe as to merit mentioning in the first annual report from the Financial Stability Oversight Council as a potential systemic threat.

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Any Bright Ideas?

08/16/11

Jean Braucher has noted the FHFA's RFI on foreclosure prevention. A huge problem with any proposal is the time to implementation for anything. It took months to develop flops like FHASecure, Hope4Homeowners, and FHAShortRefi.

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Are Corporations People Too?

08/16/11

The "corporations are people, my friend" line was quite the momement. But as bad as it sounded, Mitt had a theoretical point. People (as well as other corporations) own corporations and people work for corporations.  The problem isn't that there aren't people at the end of the line behind corporations. The problem is that it's a minority of (primarily wealthier)people.  

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The Systemic Risk Industry

08/16/11

There seems to be a cottage industry now in proposals to solve and/or mitigate systemic risk. I'm myself somewhat of a guilty party. The producers here are law profs and economists (and probably some other disciplines as well). These proposals fall into three buckets. One focuses on executive compensation as the key area for reform, a second on activity and/or size limitations, and the third on changing banks' capital structures.

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Bankruptcy Politics and State Bankruptcy

08/16/11

I have a new paper out, Bankrupt Politics and the Politics of Bankruptcy, that examines state bankruptcy proposals and then uses them as a jumping-off point for sketching out a political theory of bankruptcy as a "creditor's armistice," an unstable political bargain, rather than an economic bargain ala Jackson & Baird's "creditor's bargain."  

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Dear Gov. Perry: Bernanke Is No Traitor

08/16/11

The GOP presidential hopeful went too far in suggesting that Bernanke's policies are "treasonous."

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Egg-Purse Designer’s Company Cracks in Bankruptcy

08/16/11

Celebrities have been understandably hesitant to carry Alex Caldwell’s handbags down the runway.

But Hollywood has found other reasons to call upon the purse designer, whose egg-shaped art pieces have made it possible for fashion-bold women to wear art inspired by legendary Russian jeweler Peter Carl Faberge—yes, the guy who made the eggs—over their shoulders.

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The Daily Docket: Lehman Goes After Broker Bonuses

08/16/11

Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. is going after dozens of former brokers who Lehman says must pay back bonus money they received when joining the firm, and so far the investment bank is faring quite well. Read the Daily Bankruptcy Review article here.

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