Bed Bath & Beyond, the home goods retailer, has filed bankruptcy under Chapter 11 and plans to conduct liquidation sales and close all of its brick-and-mortar stores by June 30, as reported by The New York Times. The retailer points to an inability to adjust to the growth of online shopping as a reason

Bloomberg confirms that 2020 was the biggest year for large commercial bankruptcies since the Great Recession in 2009.  Led by the energy, retail, and consumer services sectors, 224 companies with liabilities exceeding $50 million filed Chapter 7 and 11 cases, far exceeding the number of large filings each year in the preceding decade. Bloomberg also

As reported in Yahoo Finance, the first trading day of 2021 was off to a rocky start in the U.S.  Despite progress on COVID vaccine distribution, markets reacted to the discovery of a highly transmissible strain of COVID in the US, which comes with a greater risk of lockdowns, along with uncertainty surrounding the

Reuters reports that the Brazilian government will forgive approximately US$1.3 billion worth of debt owed to it by telecommunications firm Oi SA, which has been involved in a pending bankruptcy proceeding in Brazil since 2016. [Reuters; Nov. 27, 2020]

Reporting from Bloomberg indicates that boutique apparel chain Francesca’s Holdings Corp. is preparing to file for

Reporting from Bloomberg shows that during the first eight months of the COVID-19 pandemic, approximately $52 billion of rent under retail leases went unpaid.  The reporting further indicates that in many instances, these rent obligations have been deferred through out-of-court agreements between landlords and tenants and that there may be an appetite for further relief

In the November 2020 statement issued by its Federal Open Market Committee, the Federal Reserve committed to use the full range of tools available to it to alleviate the economic hardship caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. To that end, the Federal Reserve indicated that it intends to keep the target range for the federal reserve

The Wall Street Journal reports that U.S. consumer retail spending rose 1.9% in September 2020. September is the fifth straight month of retail sales growth according to the United States Department of Commerce. [WSJ; Oct. 16, 2020]

The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in City of Chicago, Illinois v. Robbin L. Fulton, et al.

The Wall Street Journal reports that Dutch retail chain HEMA B.V. sought protection under chapter 15 of the United States Bankruptcy Code on August 19, 2020 in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York while it seeks to complete a restructuring of approximately US$474 million of debt in the United

The Wall Street Journal reports that Aeromexico, Mexico’s flagship airline which filed for bankruptcy in the US earlier this year, has obtained commitments for up to a $1 billion in debtor-in-possession financing facility from Apollo Global Management Inc. The financing consists of two tranches, with one tranche holding a debt-to-equity conversion option. [WSJ; Aug. 14,

Bloomberg reports on the growing use of chapter 11 bankruptcy by large retail tenants in order to negotiate their way out of costly, long-term leases and the potential downstream effects of this process on both the commercial real estate and commercial mortgage backed securities markets. [Bloomberg; Aug. 6, 2020]

The Wall Street Journal reports that