COVID-19

Federal Reserve Banks and Federal Home Loan Banks May Accept Pledges of PPP Loans as Collateral

04/24/20

The Small Business Administration’s (“SBA”) Paycheck Protection Program (“PPP”) guarantees loans from qualified lenders to small businesses impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic so that those businesses can keep workers employed.  In the Third Interim Final Rule issued on April 20, 2020 (see 85 Fed. Reg.

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Further Thoughts on Necessity as a Reason to Defer Sovereign Debt Obligations

04/23/20

Mitu and I posted some preliminary thoughts about the defense of necessity, which might be raised as a basis for allowing sovereign borrowers to defer debt service during the crisis. I wanted to follow up on some of the open issues. A few are technical, addressing some potential objections to the defense.

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Election Time: Bankruptcy Code 1111(B) in the Post-COVID World

04/23/20

Among the only certainties for the post-COVID lending world is the uncertainty of commercial real estate values.  Among the classes of real estate that surely will be immediately diminished in value are hospitality and most brick and mortar retail, but even the value of industrial and office properties will be closely scrutinized as questions are posed regarding changes in how companies conduct their businesses and which types of businesses will recover most fully.  Ignoring the obvious challenges faced by hotels, stores, movie theaters and restaurants, will office buildings ever re-fill wi

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Necessity in the Time of COVID-19

04/21/20

Mark Weidemaier and Mitu Gulati

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Computational Framework for Determining Number of Employees for Eligibility, Qualifying Loan Amount and Forgiveness for a PPP Loan

04/20/20

The Paycheck Protection Program (“PPP”), as enacted under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, provides federally-guaranteed loans up to a maximum amount of $10 million to qualified businesses, which can be fully forgivable, to encourage businesses to retain employees through the COVID-19 crisis by assisting in the payment of certain operational costs.

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Now That Everyone Is on the Standstill Bandwagon ... Where to? Part I

04/20/20

A sovereign debt standstill might not cure COVID-19, but it sure seems like the one thing we can all agree on.

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A Coming Consumer Bankruptcy Tsunami, Wave, or Ripple?

04/16/20

With the Covid-19 pandemic, there has been a lot of talk about a coming surge of consumer bankruptcy filings. In the very short-term, however, bankruptcy filing numbers are down. According to data from Epiq Systems, daily bankruptcy filings declined 18.4% in March 2020 on a year-over-year basis. March 2020 filings were 62,847 as compared to 73,521 in March 2019 but were spread out over one more business day (and hence had an even lower daily filing rate).

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COVID-19: “Avoiding” Harm to Corporate Good Samaritans

04/16/20

The impact of COVID-19 is being felt at all levels of the economy and will work its way through bankruptcy courts for years to come.  In these early days, many creditors who are themselves suffering are providing assistance to troubled companies.  Suppliers and commercial landlords are agreeing to various forms of relief, including modified credit terms and rent relief to allow customers to bridge this period of unprecedented disruption.  While these corporate goo

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