CreditSlips

"Middle Class Faux"?

01/09/20

I did some digging into Joe Biden's previously unexplored roll call vote on floor amendments to BAPCPA. They were ugly then and have not improved with age. My full take is in The American Prospect. 

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Consumer Bankruptcy, Done Correctly, To Help Struggling Americans

01/07/20

Today, Senator Elizabeth Warren unveiled her new plan to reform the consumer bankruptcy system. The plan is simple, yet elegant. It is based on actual data and research (including some of my own with Consumer Bankruptcy Project co-investigators Slipster Bob Lawless, former Slipster, now Congresswoman Katie Porter, and former Slipster Debb Thorne).

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600,000 student loan borrowers getting nowhere

12/24/19
Student loan borrowers who plan to apply for Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF)  after ten years of income-based payments are simply not getting their
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Hinrichsen on Iraq’s Debt Restructuring

12/21/19

Iraq’s debt restructuring a decade and a half ago was one of the few things that went right with the US incursion into that country in 2003.  Thanks to a combination of an expensive war with Iran, mismanagement and corruption on the part of Saddam and his henchmen, and the debilitating effect of international sanctions on the economy, Iraq in 2003 found itself with one of the largest sovereign defaulted debt stocks in history.  Worse, thanks to the sanctions regime, much of the unpaid debt had, by the time of Saddam’s removal, matured into judgement

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Yadav on Dodgy Debt Buybacks

12/20/19

I’ve long been fascinated by debt buybacks by issuers, in large part because they seemed to occupy a loophole in the securities disclosure laws.  A company could do a buyback of bonds and, because bondholders are not owed fiduciary duties by the company, there was no requirement for disclosure.

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Perhaps Preferential Transfer Litigation is Not Worth the Cost- two tiny adjustments in that direction.

12/20/19

Although the primary thrust of the Small Business Reorganization Act of 2019 which was signed by the President on August 23 is to provide relief to reorganizing small businesses, the act has two provisions that are intended to provide  some relief from the threat of questionable and small dollar bankruptcy preference claims.

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Supreme Court Grants Cert To Decide Fate of Repossessed Cars in Bankruptcy

12/19/19

Yesterday, the SCOTUS granted certiorari in City of Chicago v. Fulton, 19-357, to resolve a circuit split about whether a creditor's inaction in not returning property repossessed pre-petition can violate the automatic stay. The split arises predominately from chapter 13 cases in which, pre-petition, creditors repossessed or cities impounded debtors' cars.

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Bankruptcy and Mindfulness

12/17/19

The practice of mindfulness and other types of meditation are growing on the coasts and within the law school and lawyer communities. Perhaps these practices can provide meaningful benefits to bankruptcy clients, bankruptcy lawyers and bankruptcy professors and judges. The essence of "mindfulness for lawyers" efforts begins with the notion that the adversary system can take a toll on home life, friendships and our own notions of who we want to be.

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Hope for helping the prospective payday loan customer

12/17/19
Short term (payday) loans and high interest consumer installment loans
continue to deplete low income households of micro dollars and their
communities of macro dollars. Although the CFPB seems intent on supporting
the depletions, a good number of states have provided some relief. 
Even in states without interest rate limitations
there are a couple of ideas that can help.

Chris Peterson and Nathalie Martin have provided legal support

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