News & Publications

Transfers and transactions up to ten years old may be scrutinized, unwound and recovered by a trustee, the bankruptcy court sitting in Massachusetts recently held in the NECCO (think chalky wafer candy) bankruptcy case. The ruling, in a case of first impression in Massachusetts, expands the reach back period from the typical four-year period for fraudulent transfer recovery, so long as the IRS is a creditor in the case. Bankruptcy Code § 544(b)(1) permits a [...]

In her Secured Transactions column, Barbara M. Goodstein discusses two recent decisions in the Sports Authority bankruptcy which underscore the continuing challenge to UCC commentators in guiding courts and practitioners effectively through the world of consignments. In a typical consignment, a seller (the consignor) delivers goods to an intermediary or middleman (the consignee) which holds those goods for sale to a third party. The goods can be sold to the consignee, or they can be [...]

A recent opinion from the Supreme Court in Mission Prod. Holdings, Inc. v. Tempnology, LLC, 139 S. Ct. 1652 (2019), reaffirms that bankruptcy does not change all that much. The Supreme Court has long recognized the distinction between the equitable administration of property and claims imposed by federal bankruptcy law and the creation and definition of property and claims under applicable non-bankruptcy law.1 But, practitioners, whether wily or oblivious, have not always headed this well-established "basic federal [...]