An overvalued property may now have a bigger impact on a secured creditor’s bottom-line during bankruptcy. Splitting with the Seventh Circuit, the Fifth Circuit in Southwest Securities, FSB v. Segner (In the Matter of Domistyle, Inc.), 2015 WL 9487732, held that a bankruptcy trustee may surcharge its expenses for maintaining a property even before moving to abandon the property.
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What Are the New Partnership Audit Rules?
The recently enacted Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015 amended the existing rules governing tax audits of partnerships in the U.S.
Who Does this Effect and When?
The new rules primarily impact partnerships with more than 100 partners and will generally apply to partnership taxable years after December 31, 2017. A partnership may elect to apply the new rules to tax returns for partnership taxable years after November 2, 2015 and before January 1, 2018. Certain partnerships with 100 (or fewer) partners may opt to elect out of the new rules and instead be subject to audits at the partner level.
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CREFC Industry Leaders Conference 2016
The 2016 CRE Finance Council Industry Leaders Conference, held this week in Miami, was dominated by two topics– risk retention and liquidity. Almost all the forums, panels and presentations at the conference were overshadowed by the specter of risk retention and more general concerns about liquidity.
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MiFID II – Still arriving on January 3, 2017
Frequent subscribers of this blog may remember MiFID I coming into force on 1 November 2007, fundamentally revising the existing rules applicable to, amongst others, European firms providing portfolio management and broker dealer services in the EU.
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Three Important Structured Finance Court Decisions of 2015
The courts have been busy this year, handing down several key decisions which have affected the structured finance landscape. Among them are Omnicare, Ace Securities and Madden. In the grand tradition of the Golden Turkey Awards due out later this month (and without stealing any of their thunder), this post is a quick review of these important cases.
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DAMITT – How Long Does it Take to Conduct U.S. Antitrust Merger Investigations?
Dechert’s Antitrust Merger Investigation Timing Tracker (DAMITT) finds that significant antitrust merger investigations in the U.S. currently are taking 10 months which is about 30%−40% longer than in prior years.
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BDCs As Creditors of Distressed Companies: What You Need to Know
An increase of defaults and rising debts have Business Development Companies (BDCs) concerned as the trend may lead to a number of distressed credits within their portfolios. Specialists from Dechert and Houlihan Lokey will address these concerns and potential solutions which matter to BDCs during a webinar taking place on Wednesday, September 9. The webinar will focus on structuring issues (e.g., portfolio eligibility, valuations, MIP implications, etc.), tax considerations (e.g., distribution requirements, qualifying or good income test, asset diversification, etc.) as well as bankruptcy and restructuring concerns.
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MERS: Better Than a Faster Horse
MERSCORP, Inc. (“MERS”) has been under fire for years. We wrote about it a while back when residential mortgage borrowers challenged the ability of MERS to foreclose on mortgages it held on the theory that MERS, as a mere nominee to the lender, was not a real party in interest. More recently, local recording offices have filed class action suits against MERS arguing that the MERS system prevented them from collecting fees supposedly required under state law. Now there’s a sympathetic plaintiff! In the past month, the Third Circuit and Fifth Circuit both rejected these arguments.
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Risk Retention Realized – Potential Solutions for CLO Market Participants
In anticipation of the effective date of the Final Rule on December 24, 2016 (early Christmas gift?), CLO market participants have been constructing solutions that allow collateral managers to raise the capital necessary to support investments required by the Final Rule.
We have seen an increased use of a hybrid structure that has been referred
Volcker Rule – Five Years On
After years of delays, changes and significant debate, the Volcker Rule is now, largely, in full effect. Sold to a sometimes intellectually incurious Congress and the electorate as a central piece of legislation to limit systemic risks to the financial system, the Volcker Rule, among other things, prohibits “banking entities” from engaging in proprietary trading activities and acquiring or retaining “ownership interests” in (or acting as sponsors of) certain “covered funds.”
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