Upcoming Public Events for Unjust Debts

More upcoming events open to the public - in person and virtual - for the new book Unjust Debts, including tonight in Washington DC. Join the conversation!

• Monday July 8, 7pm ET: Politics & Prose, with Vicki Shabo, Senior Fellow at New America
• Wednesday, July 17, 3pm ET VIRTUAL: Roosevelt Institute, with think tank director Hannah Kroch-Blegley
• Thursday, July 18, 5:30 PM: Fletcher Free Library, Burlington VT, with Vermont State Treasurer Mike Pieciak
• Sunday, July 21, 10:30 AM: Temple Beth Shalom, Brigantine NJ (contact me for registration information). 
• Friday August 16, 12pm PT/3pm ET VIRTUAL: Berkeley Judicial Institute/Berkeley Civil Justice Research Initiative, with Professor Abbye Atkinson

 

A Uniform Law Project of Note: Special Deposits Act

Last week, bolstered by a continuing legal education program offered by the American Law Institute, I started studying a new uniform law that will be recommended to your state legislature in the coming days and months. It is called the Special Deposits Act. As of today it has not yet been enacted by a state legislature. But trust me when I predict that you want to study it too - especially because the choice of law rules will work differently for this uniform law than for, say, the digital assets amendments to the Uniform Commercial Code. In other words, if one of the green states in the map below adopts the law, parties can contract for that state to govern the special deposit as well as to be the forum for disputes, even if there's no other relationship with that state.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A special deposit is payable on the occurrence of a contingency and the identity of the party entitled to the funds is uncertain until the contingency happens. Right now, the law governing special deposits is nonuniform and the details can be uncertain, including the rights of creditors against those funds. One big impact of this uniform Special Deposits Act is this: in broadest terms, if a bank and depositor agree that a deposit account is a special deposit, and it meets the requirements for permissible purpose under the law, this law says that the funds in that account are not property of the depositor, including if the depositor files for bankruptcy, and cannot be reached by the depositors' creditors. (Fraudulent transfer law still applies and the drafters say there are other anti-fraud measures in place). The bankruptcy world may be interested in this law for an additional reason: possible use of special deposits in a bankruptcy case to pay professionals, or for large numbers of claimants, etc.

I also find this law interesting because of its implications for loans secured by deposit accounts under Article 9 of the Uniform Commercial Code. Even if a bank has a security interest in all deposit accounts of a debtor held by a bank, and is automatically perfected by control, the bank's enforcement rights are far more limited against the special deposit than against a typical bank account. In general, the bank cannot exercise rights of setoff or recoupment against a special deposit.

Again, as of today no state has enacted the Special Deposits Act. But given how the law is drafted, it will take just one state to adopt it, and for lawyers to encourage banks and depositors to opt in to that state's law, to have a much broader effect. Check out the materials here.

Catching Up on the Digital Asset Amendments to the Uniform Commercial Code

It has been a while since I last posted resources on amendments to the Uniform Commercial Code that would govern transactions in digital assets, including security interests. The take-up of these amendments, including a new Article 12, has not been as swift and sweeping as some might have hoped. To put it mildly, some in the cryptocurrency world have lobbied hard against enactment based on what seems to be a misinterpretation (to help set things straight, I recommend reading and listening to professors Juliet Moringiello and Carla Reyes). Currently, 11 states have enacted the amendments.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thorny choice of law issues flowing from non-uniform enactment inevitably will land in bankruptcy courthouses, as so many legal quandaries do. For example, choice of law will affect whether or not a lender has a perfected security interest in the debtor's interest in cryptocurrency, an issue that can arise in a wide variety of bankruptcies. Here is a collection of Uniform Law Commission resources in case you need them.

New Resource on Uniform Commercial Code Reform for Digital Assets including Crytocurrency

Earlier this fall I linked to a variety of resources, including webinars, on amendments to the Uniform Commercial Code to account for various types of digital assets. The scope includes but is not limited to commercial transactions involving cryptocurrency.

To add to these resources, a version of the amendments that includes official comments is now available.  

Because there will not be a uniform effective date, and some states have gotten an early start by implementing prior drafts of the amendments (see prior post), these could swiftly become relevant to transactions and disputes, including those that land in bankruptcy court. 

Getting Ready for Uniform Commercial Code Reform?

IAs digital assets and emerging technologies become common in commercial transactions, state commercial law must rise to the challenge - that's the driving force behind a new set of amendments to the Uniform Commercial Code, including Article 9 governing secured transactions in personal property - such as in virtual currencies and nonfungible tokens.

No state has enacted the amendments yet,* but prior reforms to Article 9, at least, have been remarkably successful at achieving broad enactment. Consider, for example, the visual of the 2010 amendments to Article 9. Blue=enacted!

How to track developments? Here are some publicly available resources courtesy of the Uniform Law Commission:

First, here is where to find the actual amendments as finally approved by the Uniform Law Commission and the American Law Institute. 

Second, here is a summary. Note the mention at the bottom of transition rules for lenders who followed existing law in perfecting security interests, etc. (by the way, there is not a prospective uniform effective date for these amendments). 

Third, videos! Here's one highlighting the changes for digital assets. And here's another on other matters covered in the amendments. 

Fourth, here's where proposed bills and enactment information will be tracked.

*According to the digital assets video, some states adopted earlier versions of part or all of these amendments (New Hampshire, Iowa, Nebraska, Indiana, Arkansas, and Texas) but are expected to update those to conform with the final versions. Wyoming and Idaho went their own way on commercial transactions in digital assets.  

Harmony or Mismatch? A virtual event on mass torts and bankruptcy on February 28

Just wanted to make sure Credit Slips readers were aware of this virtual event at noon Eastern/3 Pacific on February 28. Bonus: a link to a masterful analysis of the topic by Professor Elizabeth Gibson that the Federal Judicial Center published in 2005. (click here for information and registration)

New Year, New Data in Your Credit Score

During 2021, reports from the CFPB and consumer advocates spotlighted the role of credit scoring in people's financial growth or stagnation and decline. These reports emphasized racial and ethnic disparities in credit scores and in complaints about errors in credit reports. Congressmembers introduced three draft bills aimed at improving credit reporting. Given the problems with traditional credit reports and scores, along with barriers to access to credit and other opportunities faced by the credit invisible, the idea of alternative credit scoring was raised repeatedly last year -- in reports, news stories, and in the draft bills. Seemingly in reaction, starting now, Experian is adding data about "buy now, pay later" loans to credit reports. Soon after Transunion announced that it was “well on [its] way” to including the same data.

Sara Greene and I have a new paper about credit reporting and scores, "Credit Scoring Duality," that focuses on the benefits and potential problems of adding alternative data to credit scoring models. Adding more data to credit scores, at first, may seem appealing. More data = better, more accurate scores? However, the use of this alternative data will not necessarily make the credit invisible or people with low credit scores more attractive. Much of the additional data proposed suffer from the same demographic disparities as the data already incorporated into credit scores. That is, in general, the people supposedly helped by inclusion of alternative data are likely to perform below-average on these inputs. Beyond replicating already present disparities, Greene and I worry that pointing to alternative credit scoring as a solution will distract from larger, systemic issues that are shown by disparities in credit scores. For more details, see our draft paper.

Non-Debtor Releases

I have an op-ed in Bloomberg Law about the abuse of non-debtor releases. Many chapter 11 attorneys argue that non-debtor releases are an essential all-purpose deal lubricant and that the excesses of a few cases—Purdue Pharma, Boy Scouts—shouldn't result in throwing out the baby with the bath water. I disagree. There's no question that non-debtor releases can grease a deal (and let's put aside the questionable practice of attorneys negotiating plans that give them releases as well). But so what? There's also a little thing called due process. It's only within the tunnel vision of chapter 11 that reorganization trumps all. Hopefully the Nondebtor Release Prohibition Act, which passed out of the House Judiciary Committee last month will become law and clarify the matter. 

Indeed, are non-debtor releases actually so important for practice? Chapter 11 lived with them for years before Mansville and even after Mansville it was years before they started being used in non-asbestos cases. Indeed, can anyone actually point to a case where a debtor would have had to liquidate and jobs would have been lost but for non-debtor releases? Perhaps there is such a case, but if so, it's the exception.

Take Purdue Pharma. What would have been the alternative to boughten releases for the Sacklers?  Perhaps a liquidating plan, but I'm not sure that it would have resulted in any job loss, just a going-concern sale. And the estate could have sold its own litigation claims against the Sacklers or put them into a litigation trust. To be sure, one might argue that the boughten releases for the Sacklers are a better deal economically for the estate, and that's the proper measure when considering a settlement of estate claims, but I do not see how the estate—or any bankruptcy judge—can constitutionally impose a settlement of creditors' direct claims against non-debtors. It doesn't comport with due process and it's pretty clearly an uncompensated taking.

I'm sure some readers will disagree, and comments are welcome. Further affiant sayeth not. 

What attorneys' general talk about when they talk about bankruptcy

Surely not the only thing that state attorneys' generals talk about when they talk about bankruptcy, but a common thing. To wit: 43 sign a letter advocating for a change to venue law in federal bankruptcy cases. Press release here.  

 

Who extracts the benefits of big business bankruptcy?

The Deal has a new podcast called Fresh Start hosted by journalist Stephanie Gleason. Stephanie and I recently chatted about big bankruptcies with litigation management at their core and the stakes those cases raise. We covered a lot of ground along the way, including non-debtor releases and the SACKLER Act, notice and voting, forum shopping, equitable mootness, the homogeneity of the restructuring profession, bankruptcy administrators and the United States Trustee system, and the skinny clause of the Constitution at the heart of all of this. We begin by reminiscing about the mass tort and future claims discussion during the deliberations of the National Bankruptcy Review Commission, for which Elizabeth Warren was the reporter, and how much has changed. Check it out here.

Five reasons to read Unsettled by Ryan Hampton

Ryan Hampton, author of a book about the Purdue Pharma bankruptcy published earlier this month, is a "national addiction recovery advocate, community organizer, author, and person in long-term recovery" who also was a member of the Purdue Pharma bankruptcy official unsecured creditors' committee. On Purdue's committee, Hampton and three other personal injury claimants sat alongside five institutional/corporate creditors, at least some of which were defendants in other opioid crisis lawsuits.  This is a quick post to recommend that the bankruptcy world read Unsettled for at least the five following reasons: 

District Judge to Purdue: "You Don't Get to Choose Your Judge"

"[Y]ou don't get to choose your judge." That's what US District Judge Colleen McMahon wrote to Purdue Pharma, in response to an ex parte letter Purdue had written to her addressing a possible motion to withdraw the reference to the bankruptcy court for a third-party release and injunction. 

The irony here is incredible. I suspect that Judge McMahon does not realize that judge picking is precisely what Purdue Pharma did to land its case before Judge Drain, rather than going on the wheel in Bowling Green and risking landing a judge who does not believe that there is authority to enter third-party releases.

The problem with judge picking is that it creates an appearance of impropriety. And judge picking is the original sin in Purdue's bankruptcy. It has tainted everything in the case. It will mean that however much money the Sacklers pay, there will always be the suspicion that they would have had to pay a lot more had the case been randomly assigned to another judge, who might not have stayed litigation against them for nearly two years.

Venue Reform: Once More Unto the Breach

Chapter 11 venue reform is back and not a moment too soon. The perennial problem of forum shopping has devolved into naked judge picking with what appears to be competition among a handful of judges to land large chapter 11 case. The results are incredible: last year 57% of the large public company bankruptcies ended up before just three judges, and 39% ended up before a single judge. When judges compete for cases, the entire system is degraded. Judges who want to attract or retain the flow of big cases cannot rule against debtors (or their private equity sponsors) on any key issues. If they do, they are branded as "unpredictable" and the business flows elsewhere. The result is that we are seeing a weaponization of bankruptcy and procedural rights, particularly for nonconsensual or legacy creditors being trampled.  

Recognizing this problem, Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) and Ken Buck (R-CO) introduced the bipartisan Bankruptcy Venue Reform Act of 2021, H.R. 41931. The bill would require debtors to file where their principal place of business or principal assets are located—in other words in a location with a real world connection with the debtor's business. 

Fake Lender Rule Repeal

The House is schedule to take up a vote on repealing the OCC's "Fake Lender Rule," that would deem a loan to be made by a bank for usury purposes as long as the bank is a lender of record on the loan. Under the rule, issued in the waning days of the Trump administration, the bank is deemed to be the lender if its name is on the loan documentation, irrespective any other facts. Thus, under the rule, it does not matter if the bank was precommitted to selling the loan to a nonbank, which undertook the design, marketing, and underwriting of the loan. The bank's involvement can be a complete sham, and yet under the OCC's rule, it loan would be exempt from state usury laws because of the bank's notional involvement. The Fake Lender Rule green lights rent-a-bank schemes, which have proliferated as the transactional structure of choice for predatory consumer and small business lenders. 

Fortunately, the Fake Lender Rule can still be overturned under the Congressional Review Act, which allows certain recently made rules to be overturned through a filibuster-free joint resolution of Congress. Such a joint resolution passed the Senate 52-47 last month. Now the House is poised for its own vote. While the Senate vote was largely on partisan lines, some Republicans did join with Democrats to vote for the repeal. The dynamics in the House are somewhat different, as certain Democratic members have been opposed to the bill, but the fact that a vote is scheduled suggests that there should be the votes for repeal. 

The repeal of the Fake Lender has been endorsed by a group of 168 scholars from across the country, including yours truly and many Slipsters. You can read our letter urging the repeal here. 

Bankruptcy on Last Week Tonight with John Oliver

The consumer bankruptcy system has made it to late-night television! The main segment on Last Week Tonight with John Oliver this week focused on bankruptcy. As described: "John Oliver details why people file for bankruptcy, how needlessly difficult the process can be, and the ways we can better serve people struggling with debt." Twenty minutes about consumer bankruptcy!

Per usual, it's a well-researched, understandable, and fast-moving segment, with dashes of dark humor. My favorite references Julianne Moore's character in Magnolia. To the well-research part: It is supported by a host of papers about consumer bankruptcy, including the work of several current and former Slipsters. Among them is Portraits of Bankruptcy Filers (forthcoming Georgia Law Review), the most recent article based on Consumer Bankruptcy Project (CBP) data, co-authored with Slipster Bob Lawless and former Slipster Debb Thorne. In Portraits, we rely on data from 2013 to 2019 to describe who is using the bankruptcy system, providing the first comprehensive overview of bankruptcy filers in thirty years.   

Also referenced are Life in the Sweatbox, former Slipster Angela Littwin's The Do-It Yourself Mirage: Complexity in the Bankruptcy System, Slipster Bob Lawless, Jean Braucher, and Dov Cohen's Race, Attorney Influence, and Bankruptcy Chapter Choice, and the ABI Commission on Consumer Bankruptcy's report. The segment closes by highlighting the Consumer Bankruptcy Reform Act of 2020 (and includes a bonus at the end, which you'll have to watch to find out what that's about).

74 Law Professors Sign Letter in Support of the Consumer Bankruptcy Reform Act

Last week, Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Representative Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) introduced the Consumer Bankruptcy Reform Act of 2020 (CBRA). As Slipster Adam Levitin detailed, the CBRA proposes a single chapter structure designed to streamline the consumer bankruptcy process. This morning, 74 bankruptcy and consumer law professors sent to Senator Warren a letter in support of the CBRA.

As the letter states, the signatories support the CBRA because it "provides a thoughtful, workable, and comprehensive response to the problems that plague the current consumer bankruptcy system." Before I discuss the letter further, a disclosure: I spearheaded this letter and circulated it among bankruptcy and consumer law scholars for signature.

In detailing our support of the CBRA, the letter points out the key ways in which the current consumer bankruptcy system can fail to provide effective relief and can shut people out because they cannot afford an attorney. Adam's recent post discusses research about substantial regional differences in the use of bankruptcy and the disparate use of chapter 13 by Black households--and the consequences of these differences on bankruptcy's uniformity and on access to justice. The CBRA will simplify the filing process, reduce fees, and address racial and gender disparities. Its new chapter 10 will allow people to address their most pressing concerns, whether that be keeping homes, keeping cars, staying in rental property, or discharging debts. It also provides for a discharge of student loan debt. And it addresses debt collection in bankruptcy cases by expanding the FDCPA and giving the CFPB some supervision and enforcement authority in consumer bankruptcy cases.

Importantly, as noted at the end of the letter, the new single chapter is not a free ride. People who can pay will not be able to walk away from their obligations. Overall, the CBRA will address systemic issues and other problems that plague the current consumer bankruptcy system. Find the full letter from law professors here.

The Consumer Bankruptcy Reform Act of 2020

Today Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Dick Durbin (D-IL), and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) and Representatives Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) and David Cicilline (D-RI) introduced the Consumer Bankruptcy Reform Act of 2020. This is the first major consumer bankruptcy reform legislation to be introduced since the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005 (BAPCPA). Whereas BAPCPA introduced a number of major, but targeted reforms to consumer bankruptcy law (and also a few business bankruptcy provisions as well), the CBRA is a much more ambitious bill:  it proposes a wholesale reform of the structure of consumer bankruptcy law with an eye toward reduces the costs and frictions that prevent consumers from being able to address their debts in bankruptcy.

This is a long post with an extended overview of the bill. The bill's sponsors have a one-page version or a two-page summary, but I figure you're here at the Slips because you just can't get enough bankruptcy law, and we're happy to oblige. Let me start with a disclosure, though. I was privileged to provide assistance with the bill, along with several other Slipsters. That means I know what's in it, and I think it's a really good and important piece of legislation that I hope will become law. 

A New Chapter 10 for Consumer Bankruptcy (Eliminating Consumer 7s and Chapter 13) 

Whereas consumer bankruptcy has long existed in two primary flavors—liquidations (chapter 7) and repayment plans (chapter 13)—the CBRA proposes a single chapter structure (a new chapter 10).  Under the CBRA, individual debtors would no longer be eligible for chapter 7, and chapter 13 would be repealed in its entirety. All individual debtors with debts of less than $7.5 million would be eligible for chapter 10; those with larger debts would have to file for 11 (or 12 if they qualify).  It's important to keep this structure in mind when evaluating the CBRA. While the CBRA takes elements from chapters 7 and 13, the CBRA is not trying to replicate existing 7 or 13. That means if you come to CBRA with a mindset of "wait, that's not how we do it in 13," well, yeah, that's kind of the point. 

The CBRA is a huge bill (188-pages) with a lot of provisions. In addition to the new chapter 10, it also contains amendments to numerous provisions in chapters 1, 3, and 5 of the Bankruptcy Code, as well to certain federal consumer financial protection statutes. I'm not going to try to cover everything in detail, but I want to cover how chapter 10 would work, as well as some of the highlights from other provisions. This is a very long post, but I think it's important for there to be a clear statement of how chapter 10 would work because there will undoubtedly be some misinterpretations of the bill, and I'd like to see consideration of the bill be on its actual merits.  

Commercial and Contract Law: Questions, Ideas, Jargon

In the Spring I am teaching a research and writing seminar called Advanced Commercial Law and Contracts. Credit Slips readers have been important resources for project ideas in the past, and I'd appreciate hearing what you have seen out in the world on which you wish there was more research, and/or what you think might make a great exploration for an enterprising student. This course is not centered on bankruptcy, but things that happen in bankruptcy unearth puzzles from commercial and contract law more generally, so examples from bankruptcy cases are indeed welcome. You can share ideas through the comments below, by email to me, or direct message on Twitter.

Also, I am considering having the students build another wiki of jargon as I did a few years ago in another course. Please pass along your favorite (or least favorite) terms du jour in commercial finance and beyond.

Thank you as always for your input, especially during such chaotic times.

We Can Cancel Student Loans for Essential Workers Now

While the House HEROES bill's scaled-down student loan forgiveness is unlikely to become law, many essential workers are eligible for student loan cancellation now under existing law. The Public Service Loan Forgiveness program covers all police, firefighters, public school teachers, nurses, soldiers, prison guards, and contact tracers, among others. Once public servants complete 10 years of payments, the law says they get their remaining federal student debt cancelled. So far nearly 1.3 million public servants are working towards their PSLF discharges, but the US Education Department has granted only 3,141 discharges out of 146,000 applicants.

In the month of March, 5,656 borrowers applied for PSLF. 114 received a discharge.  Meanwhile another 15,000 entered the pipeline by having their first employment certification approved, bringing the total to almost 1.3 million public servants. 

I have written elsewhere about how Congress and the Education Department could fix this program, even without new legislation.

The average total student loan debt discharged for PSLF borrowers is more than $80,000. For a median income earner, monthly payments range from $250 to $900 depending on the payment plan. PSLF discharges can yield an immediate and significant savings for these workers. 

Letter from 163 Bankruptcy Judges Backs Venue Reform

Support seems to keep building even more for changes to where large corporate debtors can file chapter 11. The latest is a letter from "163 sitting, recalled, or retired United States Bankruptcy Judges." From the letter:

The venue selection options for bankruptcy cases under current law have led to forum shopping abuses that have disenfranchised local employees, creditors, and parties in interest from participation in bankruptcy cases, undermined public confidence in the integrity of the United States Courts and the bankruptcy process, inhibited the development of uniform, national bankruptcy jurisprudence, and led to inefficient allocation of judicial resources. 

The judges join forty-two state attorneys general who signed a February letter supporting similar changes. The House bill (H.R. 4421) now has fifteen co-sponsors, which I believe is more than any venue reform bill has had. With all of that support, my views don't matter much, but I agree too. 

Like I wrote before, there have been lots of efforts at venue reform, but this time feels different.

The Role of Chapter 11 Bankruptcy in Addressing the Consequences of COVID19.

Many businesses may require bankruptcy proceedings to assist in recovery from the CV Recession. In my view, the best legal approach to any Chapter 11 reforms necessitated by the emerging CV-induced economic crisis lies in building up from the Small Business Reorganization Act (SBRA) to cover more Small and Medium Enterprises (SME), rather than trying to adjust the general provisions of Chapter 11, the home of bankruptcies like General Motors and American Airlines. Our database at the Business Bankruptcy Project shows that in 2018 more than half of the businesses that filed in Chapter 11 in the Southern District of New York would fall under the temporary SBRA cap, $7.5 million.

Most immediately, the recently voted funds for small business must be available in bankruptcy reorganization cases. We must remove any barrier to using them in that way. I start the study of Chapter 11 by reminding students that the clerk at the bankruptcy court does not hand out money. Bankruptcy does not produce funding, although it can help facilitate it in important ways. Thus there is no legal reform that will avoid the need for very substantial financing with implications far beyond reorganization procedures. Bankruptcy cannot help unless it can be used in connection with rescue funding.

CARES Act Mortgage Foreclosure and Tenant Eviction Relief

The final text of the act is now available here. The foreclosure relief is in Section 4022 and the eviction moratorium is in Section 4024. Mortgage borrowers with federally related loans (FHA, VA, Farmer's Home, Fannie or Freddie) may request 6 months of forbearance, i.e. no payments required, renewable for another 6 months, during which no late fees or penalties may be imposed, but interest continues to run (unlike student loans.) Homeowners need not provide documentation; a certification that they are affected by the COVID-19 crisis is enough. There is no statutory provision for loan modification after the forbearance period ends, so unpaid payments will still be due, but the agencies will likely be requiring or encouraging servicers to offer workouts when the forbearance ends. Section 4023 provides relief for landlords of multifamily buildings with federally related mortgages, conditioned on no evictions. 

The eviction relief is limited to tenants in properties on which there is a federally related mortgage loan, and is only for 4 months. In brief, landlords may not send notices to quit or go forward with evictions. Tenant certifications of hardship are not required. An excellent summary of the eviction moratorium is available at the National Housing Law Project site here. Some states are also imposing eviction moratoria covering more tenants.

CARES ACT Student Loan Relief

The CARES Act signed into law last week suspends payments and eliminates interest accrual for all federally-held student loans for six months, through September 30. These measures exclude private loans, privately-held FFEL loans and Perkins loans. The other five subsections of section 3513 mandate important additional relief. Under subsection (c) the six suspended payments (April to September) are treated as paid for purposes of “any loan forgiveness program or loan rehabilitation program” under HEA title IV. In addition to PSLF, this would include loan cancellation at the end of the 20- or 25- year periods for income-dependent repayment. Loan rehabilitation is a vital tool for borrowers to get out of default status (with accompanying collection fees, wage garnishments, tax refund intercepts, and ineligibility for Pell grants) by making nine affordable monthly payments. This subsection seems to offer a path for six of those nine payments to be zero payments during the crisis suspension period.

Subsection (d) protects credit records by having suspended payments reported to credit bureaus as having been made. Subsection (e) suspends all collection on defaulted loans, including wage garnishments, federal tax refund offsets and federal benefit offsets.

Finally, and importantly, subsection (g) requires USED to notify all borrowers by April 11 that payments, interest and collections are suspended temporarily, and then beginning in August, to notify borrowers when payments will restart, and that borrowers can switch to income-driven repayment. This last provision attempts to avert the wave of default experienced after prior crises (hurricanes, etc.) when, after borrowers in affected areas had been automatically put into administrative forbearance, the forbearance period ended and borrowers continued missing payments. Whether the “not less than 6 notices by postal mail, telephone or electronic communication” will actually solve the payment restart problem will depend a great deal not only on the notices but also the capacity of USED servicers to handle the surge of borrower calls and emails. At present servicers are struggling with handling borrower requests because many employees are in lockdown or quarantine.

Summary of the McConnell Bailout Bill

The McConnell Bailout Bill (a/k/a HR 748 or the CARES Act), weighs in at just shy of 600 pages. I've taken the liberty of summarizing it in a powerpoint deck for teaching (syllabus be damned) and thought it might be helpful to make generally available. Here it is. (11:00 3/23 updated/corrected version).

I only warrant it as best efforts (meaning I might have misread or just missed something in this monster bill) and I have made no attempt to summarize the details of the social insurance program (UI, Medicare, Medicaid) interventions because they are outside my expertise. You'll have to read the bill itself (Part I and Part II) for that.  

I'll note quickly two things for Slips aficionados: there's no bankruptcy piece anywhere within the bill. There might end up being some very minor bankruptcy changes, but bankruptcy really isn't where the action is right now. 

You might consider how the airline bailout package in the bill compared with GM/Chrysler. That ought to be the benchmark for direct government rescue lending to real economy firms.  

COVID-19 Response: The Need for Speed

While Congress struggles to figure out the best way to respond to the coronavirus pandemic, it is very apparent that immediate relief measures are necessary, if only to buy time for a more comprehensive approach. Layoffs are already happening and with they continue, it will result in more economic disruption from diminished consumption.

1. Sending out checks isn't fast enough (and can't happen in two weeks)

There is, fortunately, some recognition of that speed is imperative, but there's a right way and a wrong way to do it. The wrong way is what the Trump administration is proposing, namely sending everyone a check. Besides being poorly tailored—$1,000 isn't enough for those who really need help and is wasted on many other folks—the problem is it just cannot happen fast enough. No one is being honest about the operational problems. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin is going around saying that he wants to get checks for $1,000 to every American within two weeks. That's just not possible, and Mnuchin should stop overpromising. 

Here's why it won't work fast enough: for Treasury to send everyone a check, it would need to know where to send the checks. It doesn't. Treasury knows where to send checks to individuals who are receiving Social Security and Disability Insurance (actually, it would be electronic transfers in almost all such cases). But what about everyone else? Treasury doesn't know (a) who is still alive, and (b) where they live. The first problem might mean sending out some checks that shouldn't happen, but the second problem is more serious, as it means that checks won't get where they need to go. Treasury is able to send me a tax refund because I give an address with my tax return. At best Treasury has year-old information, which will be wrong for many people. Those people who most need the money are the people who are most likely to have moved in the last year—economically insecure renters (see Matthew Desmond's Evicted on this). Sending everyone a check really isn't a very good solution. 

2. Foreclosure/eviction moratoria are equivalent to an immediate cash injection to the economy.

Fortunately, there's a better solution:  an immediate national moratorium on foreclosures, evictions, repossessions, utility disconnects, garnishments, default judgments, and negative credit reporting for all consumers and small businesses. The point of a national collection action moratorium is not to be nice to debtors. A national collection moratorium is a stimulus measure:  it has the effect of immediately injecting cash into the economy in that it allows people and businesses to shift funds from debt service obligations to other consumption. It's basically a giant forced loan from creditors to debtors. And it happens immediately, without any administrative apparatus. There's nothing else that will have such a big effect so immediately. Congress should move on moratorium legislation asap as a stand-alone bill to buy itself some more time for a longer-term fix.  

Now let's be clear—what I am talking about is not debt forgiveness. It is forced forbearance. The debts will still be owed and may accrue interest and late fees (there may be ways to limit those, but that's another matter). That's important because it substantially reduces the argument that the delay constitutes a Taking—government is always free to change how remedies operate, such as changing foreclosure timelines, etc. without the changes being a Taking.

This is exactly what a moratorium would be doing. A number of states and localities have already undertaken such moratoria, and FHFA and HUD have done so for federally or GSE insured or guarantied loans. But we've got a national crisis, so this should be done uniformly on the federal level using the Interstate Commerce power for the entire consumer and small business debt market. Given that all collection actions involve the mails or wires and that debt markets are national, this seems squarely within the scope of federal power. 

Now a collection moratorium is not a permanent fix and will cause some dislocations itself. Consumers/small businesses will eventually need to come current on their obligations, and they may need assistance to do so, but that's something that we can work on later when we're not in free fall. But right now what we need more than anything is time, and a collection moratorium can buy us some time more broadly and more immediately than any other possible step. 

Consumer Bankruptcy, Done Correctly, To Help Struggling Americans

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). Most importantly, I believe it will make the consumer bankruptcy system work for American families. And, as a bonus, it will tackle the bad behavior that big banks and corporations currently engage in once people file, like trying to collect already discharged debts, and some non-bankruptcy financial issues, such as "zombie" mortgages.

In short, the plan provides for one chapter that everyone files, combined with a menu of options to respond to each families' particular needs. It undoes some of the most detrimental amendments that came with the 2005 bankruptcy law, including the means test. In doing so, it sets new, undoubtedly more effective rules for the discharge of student loan debt, for modification of home mortgages, and for keeping cars. It also undoes "smaller" amendments that likely went unnoticed, but may have deleterious effects on people's lives. Warren's plan gets rid of the current prohibition on continuing to pay union dues, the payment of which may be critical to allowing people who file bankruptcy to keep their jobs and keep on their feet. Similarly, the plan eliminates problems debtors face paying rent during their bankruptcy cases, which can lead to eviction.

One chapter that everyone files means that the continued racial disparities in chapter choice my co-authors and I have documented will disappear. No means test, combined with less documentation, as provided by Warren's plan, means that the most time-consuming attorney tasks will go away. Attorney's fees should decrease. Warren's plan also provides for the payment of fees over time. People will not have to put off filing for bankruptcy for years while they struggle in the "sweatbox." Costly "no money down" bankruptcy options should disappear. People will have the chance to enter the bankruptcy system in time to save what little they have, which research has shown is key to people surviving and thriving post-bankruptcy.

Hope for Helping the Prospective Payday Loan Customer

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.

Trump Administration Declares Open Season on Consumers for Subprime Lenders

The Trump administration has just proposed a rule that declares open season on consumers for subprime lenders. The Office of Comptroller of the Currency and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (on whose board the CFPB Director serves) have released parallel proposed rulemakings that will effectively allowing subprime consumer lending that is not subject to any interest rate regulation, including by unlicensed lenders.

The Rigged Game of Private Equity

The Stop Wall Street Looting Act introduced by Senator Warren has the private equity industry's hackles up. They're going to get a chance to say their piece at a House Financial Services Committee hearing on Tuesday. The bill is a well-developed, major piece of legislation that takes a comprehensive belt-suspenders-and-elastic waist band to limit private equity abuses: it's got provisions on private equity firm liability for their portfolio company obligations, limitations on immediate looting capital distributions, protections for workers and consumers in bankruptcy, protections for investors in private equity funds, and of course a reform of private equity's favorable tax treatment. The bill shows that Senator Warren truly has the number of the private equity industry.

 

In this post I want to address the provision in the bill that seems to truly scare parts of the private equity industry: a targeted curtailment of limited liability for the general partners of private equity funds and their control persons. This provision terrifies some private equity firms because it requires private equity to put its money where its mouth is. The provision is essentially a challenge to private equity firms to show that they can make money off of the management expertise they claim, rather than by playing rigged game with loaded dice. 

 

Private equity claims to make money by buying bloated public companies, putting them on diets to make them lean and mean, and then selling the spiffed up company back to the public. The whole conceit is that private equity can recognize bloated firms and then has the management expertise to make them trim and competitive. If true, that's great. But as things currently stand, it's near impossible for a private equity general partner—that is the private equity firms themselves like Bain and KKR—to lose money, even if they have zero management expertise. That's because they're playing a rigged game. The game is rigged because there is a structural risk-reward imbalance in private equity investment. That's what the limited liability curtailment in the Stop Wall Street Looting Act corrects. Here's how the private equity game is rigged:  

Private Equity’s Chicken Little Dance

The private equity industry is lashing out at Senator Warren’s Stop Wall Street Looting Act with some pretty outlandish claims that rise to Chicken Little level. According to an analysis by the US Chamber of Commerce's Center for Capital Market Competitiveness, the bill will result in the $3.4 trillion of investment provided through private equity over the past five years entirely disappearing from the economy, along with as much as 15% of the jobs in the US economy disappearing.    

 

I cannot sufficiently underscore how laughably amateurish this claim is. I’ve seen some risible financial services industry anti-regulatory claims before, but this one really takes the cake for extreme hand-waving. I expected better from the Masters-of-the-Universe.

 

Here’s why the private equity industry’s claims are utter bunkum.

Small Biz Reorg Act Sleeper Innovations

Two aspects of the Small Business Reorganization Act of 2019 intrigued me as I looked more closely at this important new twist on Chapter 11 for the other 99%.

First, I thought the new SBRA procedure might be a fairly snooze-worthy Chapter 13 on protein supplements (i.e., not even steroids) because the current Chapter 13 debt limit (aggregate) is $1,677,125, while the new SBRA aggregate debt limit is less than double this, at $2,725,625 [note to the ABI: please update the figures in your online Code for the April 2019 indexation]. A couple of obvious and another non-obvious point cut in opposite directions here, it seems to me. First, Chapter 13 is not available to entities (e.g., LLCs), and for individuals, the Chapter 13 debt limits are broken out into secured and unsecured, while the SBRA figure is not. So the SBRA is significantly more hospitable to any small business debtor with only $500,000 in unsecured debt or, say, $1.5 million in secured debt. Flexibility is a virtue, so maybe the SBRA is just a meaningfully more flexible Chapter 13? No, as Bob's post reminded me. In the "conforming amendments" section at the end of the new law is hidden an important modification to the definition of "small business debtor" in section 101(51D), which will now require that "not less than 50 percent of [the debt] arose from the commercial or business activities of the debtor." So no using the SBRA provisions to deal more flexibly with an individual debtor's $500,000 in unsecured debt or a $1.5 million mortgage or HELOC if it's not related to business activity.

Second, this last point is the really intriguing aspect of SBRA for me. For the first time in recent memory, we see a crack in the wall that has insulated home mortgages from modification in bankruptcy. Sections 1322(b)(2) and 1123(b)(5) still prohibit the modification of claims secured by the debtor's principal residence, but the SBRA at last provides an exception to this latter provision: An SBRA plan may modify the debtor's home mortgage (including bifurcation into secured and unsecured portions?!) if "the new value received in connection with the granting of the security interest" was not used to acquire the home, but was "used primarily in connection with the small business of the debtor." A small crack it may be, but this sleeper provision strikes me as an important opening for serious discussion of modification of other non-acquisition home mortgage modifications in Chapter 13, for example. This would be a game changer after the HEL and HELOC craze of the earlier 2000s. It will doubtless provide further evidence that the HELOC market will not evaporate or even change appreciably as small business debtors begin to modify their home-secured business loans. Of course, that depends on a robust uptake of the new procedure. We shall see in 2020.

How Many New Small Business Chapter 11s?

The Small Business Reorganization Act of 2019 adds a new subchapter V to chapter 11 for small businesses. The new subchapter gives small businesses the option of choosing a more streamlined -- and hence cheaper and quicker -- procedure than they would find in a regular chapter 11. Perhaps most significantly, the absolute priority rule, which requires creditors to be paid in full before owners retain their interests, does not apply. For those interested in more detail, the Bradley law firm has a good blog post summarizing the key points of the new law, which takes effect in February 2020 (and if I have the math correct -- February 19 to be exact).

A point of discussion has been how many cases will qualify to be a small-business chapter 11. Using the Federal Judicial Center's Integrated Bankruptcy Petition Database, my calculation is that around 42% of cases filed since October 1, 2007, would have qualified. The rest of this post will explain how I came to that estimate as well as discuss year-to-year variations and chapter 11 filings by individuals.

PROMESA heads to the U.S. Supreme Court?

In February 2019, the United States Court of Appeals for First Circuit held that the selection process of the Oversight Board in PROMESA, the rather bipartisan Puerto Rico debt restructuring law (and more), is unconstitutional. The reason: its members were not selected with advice and consent of the Senate, in violation of the Appointments Clause. In other words, it held that the Appointments Clause applies even when Congress created the positions through plenary power over territories, and that Oversight Board members constitute "Officers of the United States." The First Circuit also used the de facto officer doctrine to avoid a complete do-over; it did not dismiss the Title III petition of Puerto Rico (parallel to the filing of a bankruptcy petition), it did not invalidate the already-taken acts of the Board, and the Board could continue to act, at least until the court's stay runs out (originally 90 days, then extended to July 15). 

Given that last remedial twist, even the prevailing parties found reasons to dislike the First Circuit's ruling. Like the Jevic case, the PROMESA dispute invites unlikely bedfellows. Joining Aurelius Capital Management in challenging the First Circuit's ruling on the remedy is the labor union UTIER. They likely have little in common other than wanting a new Oversight Board, or, even better, no Oversight Board. A full bouquet of certiorari petitions followed, including one by the United States/Solicitor General predicting dire consequences if the Appointment Clause ruling stands. On June 20, 2019, the Supreme Court consolidated and granted certiorari on the various petitions. Argument is to take place in October.

Senate Banking Committee Testimony on Housing Finance

I'll be testifying on Tuesday at a Senate Banking Committee hearing on housing finance that is focused on Chairman Crapo's reform outline.  My written testimony may be found here.  Suffice it to say, I'm skeptical.  I argue that a multi-guarantor system is a path to disaster and that the right approach is a single-guarantor system with back-end credit-risk transfers.  Oh wait, we already have that system in all but name.  The system has been totally reformed since 2008.  So why are we looking to do anything major with housing finance reform?  Hmmm.  

Restatement of Consumer Contracts—On-Line Symposium

The Yale Journal on Regulation is holding an on-line symposium about the draft Restatement of the Law of Consumer Contracts, which is scheduled for a vote at the American Law Institute's annual meeting this May.  The launching point for the symposium are a pair of articles in JREG that take sharp issue with the empirical studies that underlie the draft Restatement.

The American Law Institute (ALI) is a self-appointed college of cardinals of the American legal profession.  It's a limited size membership organization that puts out various publications, most notably "Restatements" of the law, which are attempts to summarize, clarify, and occasionally improve the law.  Restatements aren't actually law, but they are tremendously influential.  Litigants and courts cite them and they are used to teach law students.  In other words, this stuff matters, even if its influence is indirect. 

The draft Restatement of Consumer Contracts is founded on a set of six quantitative empirical studies about consumer contracts.  This is a major and novel move for a Restatement; traditionally Restatements engaged in a qualitative distillation of the law.  Professor Gregory Klass of Georgetown has an article that attempts to replicate the Reporters' empirical study about the treatment of privacy policies as contracts.  He finds pervasive problems in the Reporters' coding, such as the inclusion of b2b cases in a consumer contracts restatement.  

A draft version of Professor Klass's study inspired me and a number of other advisors to the Restatement project to attempt our own replication study of the empirical studies of contract modification and clickwrap enforcement.  We found the same sort of pervasive problems as Professor Klass.  While the ALI Council completely ignored our findings, we wrote them up into a companion article to Professor Klass's.  

Some of the pieces posted to the symposium so far have been focused on replication study methodology (sort of beside the point given the very basic nature of the problems we identified) or defenses of the Reporters including mixed statutory-contract decisions in their data sets (which is no defense to inclusion of b2b cases or duplicate cases or vacated cases, etc.). But Mel Eisenberg has contributed an important piece that highlights some of the substantive problems with the draft Restatement, namely that it guts consumer protections.  For example, it would require findings of both procedural and substantive unconscionability for a contract to be unconscionable, while many states only require substantive unconscionability. Not surprisingly, I am unaware of any consumer law expert (other than the Reporters) who supports the project.  

But this thing that should really be a wake up call that something is very, very off with this Restatement project is the presence of outside opposition, which is virtually unheard of in the ALI process.  Every major consumer group (also here, here, and here), weighed in in opposition as well as 13 state attorneys general (and also here), and our former co-blogger (and also former ALI Vice-Chair), Senator Elizabeth Warren.  Nor has the opposition been solely from consumer-minded groups.  The US Chamber of Commerce and the major trade associations for banking, telecom, retailers, and insurers are also opposed (albeit with very different motivations).  Simply put, it's hard to find anyone other than the Reporters (and the ALI Council, which has a strong tradition of deference to Reporters) who actually likes the draft Restatement.  

So, if you're an ALI member, get informed.  If you know an ALI member, make sure that s/he is informed.  This is coming for a vote in May and if enacted would be bad policy, based on the legal equivalent of "junk science."  This isn't what the ALI should be doing.  

Usury 2.0: Toward a Universal Ability-to-Repay Requirement

There's bi-partisan legislation pending that would prohibit the practice of installment lenders sending out unsolicited live convenience check loan:  you get an unsolicited check in the mail.  If you cash it, you've entered into a loan agreement.  

The debate about check loans has turned on whether consumers understand what they're getting into.  The legislation's sponsors say consumers don't understand all the terms and conditions, while the installment lender trade association, the American Financial Services Association, argues that there's no problem with live check loans because all the terms are clearly disclosed in large type font.  

This debate about consumer understanding and clarity of disclosure totally misses the point.  The key problem with check loans is that they are being offered without regard for the consumer's ability to repay.  For some consumers, check loans might be beneficial.  But for other they're poison.  The problem is that check loans are not underwritten for ability-to-repay, which is a problem for a product that is potentially quite harmful.  Ability to repay is the issue that should be discussed regarding check loans, not questions about borrower understanding.  Indeed, this is not an issue limited to check loans.  Instead, it is an issue that cuts across all of consumer credit.  Rather than focus narrowly on check loans, Congress should consider adopting a national ability-to-repay requirement for all consumer credit (excluding federal student loans).  

New Saudi Bankruptcy Law ... A Boon for SMEs?!

Saudi Arabia's King Salman has approved a new bankruptcy law. {Download Saudi BK final 2-2018} Commentators have heralded this new law as a boost to economic reforms, in particular to the SME sector, but I have some serious doubts about this. A member of the Shura Council, the King's advisory body, is quoted in one report as explaining "[t]he idea is to simplify and institutionalise the process of going out of business so new organisations can come in." That latter part--new businesses coming in--requires individual entrepreneurs, either the one whose business just failed or new ones, to embrace the major risks of starting a new venture. In either event, a crucial aspect of an effective SME insolvency law, and I would argue THE most crucial aspect, is a fresh start for the failed entrepreneur (and a promise of such a fresh start for potential entrepreneurs). This fresh start is promised and delivered most effectively by provision conferring a discharge of unpaid debt. The new Saudi law all but lacks this key provision. Article 125 on the bottom of page 50 is quite clear about this: "The debtor's liability is not discharged ... for remaining debts other than by a special or general release from the creditors." It seems highly unlikely to me that creditors will offer such releases with any frequency. Yes, the new law provides a useful framework for negotiating restructuring plans, and the Kingdom deserves praise and respect for finally adopting such a measure. But the lack of a law- imposed discharge following liquidation when creditors are not willing to agree is not a foundation for a thriving SME recovery (though I understand and respect the reason why the Saudi law lacks an imposed discharge). Most SMEs are not enterprises--they are entrepreneurs; they are people, not businesses. Leaving these people to bear the continuing burden of unpaid debt does not, in my mind, reinvigorate failed entrepreneurship or entice others to join the movement. I'm afraid the effects on the SME sector of this law will be muted at best. I hope I'm wrong. 

How S.2155 (the Bank Lobbyist Act) Facilitates Discriminatory Lending

If you think it's ridiculous that the CDC can't gather data on gun violence, consider the financial regulatory world's equivalent:  S.2155, formally known as the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act, but better (and properly) known as the Bank Lobbyist Act.  S.2155 is going to facilitate discriminatory lending. Let me say that again.  S.2155 is legislation that will facilitate discriminatory lending. This bill functionally exempts 85% of US banks and credit unions from fair lending laws in the mortgage market.  Support for this bill should be a real mark of shame for its sponsors. 

Bankruptcy Venue Reform -- Yes, Again, But Maybe This Is the Time?

As many Credit Slips readers will know, chapter 11 venue reform has been an issue for decades. As corporate filers have flocked to the Southern District of New York and the District of Delaware, the real reason some observers say is that these courts favor corporate managers, dominant secured lenders, bankruptcy attorneys, or a combination of all of them. Regardless of the merits of these claims, it certainly undermines respect for the rule of law when faraway federal courts decide issues affecting local interests. A great example comes from right here in Champaign, Illinois, where local company Hobbico has recently filed chapter 11. The company, a large distributor of radio-control models and other hobby products, has more than $100 million in debt. The company has over 300 employees in the Champaign area who own the company through an employee stock ownership plan. Yet, the company's fortunes are now in the hands of a Delaware bankruptcy court.

Bankruptcy's Lorelei: The Dangerous Allure of Financial Institution Bankruptcy

I have a new (short!) paper out, Bankruptcy's Lorelei:  The Dangerous Allure of Financial Institution Bankruptcy. The paper, which builds off of some Congressional testimony from 2015, makes the case that proposals for resolving large, systemically important financial institutions in bankruptcy are wrongheaded and ultimately dangerous. At best they will undermine the legitimacy of the bankruptcy process, and at worst they will result in crash-and-burn bankruptcies that exacerbate financial crises, rather than containing them.  The abstract is below.

The idea of a bankruptcy procedure for large, systemically important financial institutions exercises an irresistible draw for some policymakers and academics. Financial institution bankruptcy promises to be a transparent, law- based process in which resolution of failed financial institutions is navigated in the courts. Financial institutions bankruptcy presents itself as the antithesis of an arbitrary and discretionary bailout regime. It promises to eliminate the moral hazard of too-big-to-fail by ensuring that creditors will incur losses, rather than being bailed out. Financial institutions bankruptcy holds out the possibility of market discipline instead of an extensive bureaucratic regulatory system.

This Essay argues that financial institution bankruptcy is a dangerous siren song that lures with false promises. Instead of instilling market discipline and avoiding the favoritism of bailouts, financial institution bankruptcy is likely to simply result in bailouts in bankruptcy garb. It would encourage bank deregulation without the elimination of moral hazard that produces financial crises. A successful bankruptcy is not possible for a large financial institution absent massive financing for operations while in bankruptcy, and that financing can only reliably be obtained on short notice and in distressed credit markets from one source: the United States government. Government financing of a bankruptcy will inevitably come with strings attached, including favorable treatment for certain creditor groups, resulting in bankruptcies that resemble those of Chrysler and General Motors, which are much decried by proponents of financial institution bankruptcy as having been disguised bailouts.

The central flaw with the idea of financial institutions bankruptcy is that it fails to address the political nature of systemic risk. What makes a financial crisis systemically important is whether its social costs are politically acceptable. When they are not, bailouts will occur in some form; crisis containment inevitably trumps rule of law. Resolution of systemic risk is a political question, and its weight will warp the judicial process. Financial institutions bankruptcy will merely produce bailouts in the guise of bankruptcy while undermining judicial legitimacy and the rule of law.

Aurelius Seeks a Do-Over; Puerto Rico and the Appointments Clause Litigation

The lives of Puerto Rico residents remain profoundly disrupted by the aftermath of Hurricane Maria measured by metrics such as electricity, clean water, and health care access, with death tolls mounting. This week, though, in a federal court hearing on January 10, 2018, Puerto Rico has the extra burden of confronting Hurricane Aurelius.

Call for Commercial Law Topics (and Jargon!)

For the spring semester, I am offering advanced commercial law and contracts seminar for UNC students, and have gathered resources to inspire students on paper topic selection as well as to guide what we otherwise will cover. But given the breadth of what might fit under the umbrella of the seminar's title, the students and I would greatly benefit from learning what Credit Slips readers see as the pressing issues in need of more examination in the Uniform Commercial Code, the payments world, and beyond. Some students have particular competencies and interests in intellectual-property and/or transnational issues, so specific suggestions in those realms would be terrific. Comments are welcome below or you can write us at bankruptcyprof <at> gmail <dot> com. 

We also are going to do a wiki of commercial law jargon/terminology. So please also toss some terms our way through the same channels as above (or Twitter might be especially useful here: @melissabjacoby).

Thank you in advance for the help!

Rights of Secured Creditors in Chapter 11: New Paper

Ted Janger and I have posted a paper of interest to Credit Slips readers called Tracing Equity. We still have time to integrate feedback, so please download it and let us know what you think.

As the image accompanying this post suggests, the project was inspired in part by recommendations of the American Bankruptcy Institute's Chapter 11 Commission. Discussion of those proposals starts on page 51 of the PDF.

One of the main insights of Tracing Equity is that both Article 9 of the Uniform Commercial Code and the Bankruptcy Code distinguish between (1) lien-based priority over specific assets and their identifiable proceeds, and (2) unsecured claims against the residual value of the firm. By our reasoning, even attempts to obtain blanket security interests do not give secured lenders an entitlement to the going-concern and other bankruptcy-created value of a company in chapter 11. We explain why our read of the law is normatively preferable and, indeed, is baked into corporate and commercial law more generally--part of a large family of rules that guard against undercapitalization and judgment proofing.

Looking forward to your thoughts.

 

 

A Quiet Revolution in Pension Reform

A historic vote was announced overnight that signals a new era for large pension reform. As is often the case, "reform" here means that ordinary, hard-working folks will suffer a significant amount of pain as big companies are relieved of some liabilities, but the hope is it will be less painful than the alternative. The revolution began in 2014, when Congress adopted the Multiemployer Pension Reform Act (MPRA).  The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation guarantees a portion of the benefits due to participants in pension plans that have become insolvent, but as a result, it is also facing a nearly $100 million shortfall in its ability to cover the projected volume of its existing guarantees. Congress attempted to avert disaster by allowing particularly large and especially distressed pension funds to slash benefits themselves in order to maintain solvency. Ordinarily, this extraordinary action would, if possible at all, require an insolvency filing and court oversight of some kind, but the MPRA allows plans who aggregate benefits for many companies (multiemployer plans) to apply to the Treasury Department for administrative permission to abrogate their pension agreements and cut benefits with no court filing or general reorganization proceeding. There are, of course, restrictions on the level of distress required for such a move and the degree of proposed cuts, but the MPRA allows large pension funds to reduce the pension benefits of thousands of beneficiaries with simple administrative approval. The plan participants get a vote on such proposals, but the law builds in a presumption: Treasury-approved cuts go into effect unless a majority of plan beneficiaries votes to reject the cuts.

Guess Who's Supporting Predatory Lending?

Guess who’s sponsoring legislation to facilitate predatory lending? It’s not just the usual suspects from the GOP, but it looks like a number of centrist “New Democrats” are signing up to help predatory financial institutions evade consumer protections. 

Yup, you heard me right: Democrats. Ten years after the financial crisis, it seems like we’ve gone back to the mistakes of the Clinton years when centrist Democrats rode the financial deregulatory bandwagon. What I’m talking about is the McHenry-Meeks Madden “fix” bill, the “Protecting Consumers’ Access to Credit Act of 2017”. The bill effectively preempts state usury laws for non-bank finance companies like payday lenders in the name of ensuring access to credit, even if on extremely onerous terms.

Right now there's only one Democratic co-sponsor, but others seem to be preparing to join in. They shouldn't, and if they do sign onto this bill, it should only be in exchange for some solid consumer protections to substitute for the preempted state usury laws. This bill should be seen as a test of whether New Democrats "get it" about financial regulation. I'm hoping that they do. If not, perhaps its time to find some new Democrats.   

Senate Banking Committee Testimony

I'm testifying before the Senate Banking Committee this week about "Fostering Economic Growth: The Role of Financial Institutions in Local Communities".  It's the undercard for the Comey hearing.  The big point I'm making are that the problem is not one of economic growth, but economic distribution.  While the US economy has grown by 9% in real terms since Dodd-Frank, real median income has fallen by 0.6%.  That's pretty grim.  The gains have all gone to the top 10% and particularly the top 1%.  

None of the various deregulatory proposals put forward by the financial services industry have anything to do with growth, and they have even less to do with ensuring equitable growth. For example, changing the CFPB from a single director to a commission or switching examination and enforcement authority from CFPB to prudential regulators shouldn't have anything to do with growth.  It's a reshuffling of regulatory deck chairs.  

The banking industry has been doing incredibly well since Dodd-Frank, outperforming the S&P 500, for example.  You'd never know it, however, from their trade association talking points. It really takes a certain kind of chutzpah to demand the repeal of consumer protection laws and laws designed to prevent the privatization of gains and socialization of losses when you are already doing so much better than the typical American family.

My complete written testimony can be found here. 

Jeb Hensarling's Alternative Facts

House Financial Services Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas 5th) has an alternative fact problem. In a Wall Street Journal op-ed Hensarling alleged that "Since the CFPB’s advent, the number of banks offering free checking has drastically declined, while many bank fees have increased. Mortgage originations and auto loans have become more expensive for many Americans.”

 

The problem with these claims?  They are verifiably false.  Free checking has become more common, bank fees have plateaued after decades of steep increases, and both mortgage rates and auto loan rates have fallen. One can question how much any of these things are causally related to the CFPB, but using Hensarling's logic, the CFPB should be commended for expanding free checking and bringing down mortgage and auto loan rates. Hmmm.  

 

Below the break I go through each of Chairman Hensarling's claims and demonstrate that each one is not only unsupported, but in fact outright contradicted by the best evidence available, general FDIC and Federal Reserve Board data. 

Proposed New EU Insolvency Directive

The European Commission has just released its proposal for another Insolvency Directive, finally tackling the very sticky issue of substantive harmonization. I had hoped the Directive would push Member States toward greater harmonization of their consumer insolvency regimes, and I even made some proposals for principles and rules for such a move, but because cross-border lending to individuals for personal consumption remains quite limited in Europe (only about 5% of total household lending), the Commission concluded that "the problem of consumers' over-indebtedness should be tackled first at national level." (p. 15)  Nonetheless, the Commission's explanatory memo heartily endorses applying the principles on discharge in this new Directive (principally, providing a full and automatic discharge after a maximum 3-year process) to all natural persons, both entrepreneurs and consumers.

As to the former, though, the proposed Directive virtually shoves European national insolvency law in the direction of US law--for better or worse. The primary thrust is to encourage a rescue climate through more robust "preventive restructuring frameworks." Read: Chapter 11. The characteristics of such frameworks include leaving the debtor in possession of its assets and affairs, staying enforcement proceedings that might interfere with restructuring negotiations, mandating disclosures for proposed restructuring plans, facilitating plan adoption by creditors in classes, including a cram-down option and an explicit absolute priority rule (pp. 30, 38, not mentioning a new value corollary ... though not using the troublesome phrase "on account of its claim" in the definition of the absolute priority rule), and protecting new (DIP) financing. The importance of institutions is highlighted, with mandates concerning the expertise and training of judges, administrators, and practitioners. A few Credit Slips contributors in particular might be interested in the Commission's comment that "It is important to gather reliable data on the performance of restructuring, insolvency and discharge procedures in order to monitor the implementation and application of this Directive." The proposal thus includes detailed rules on data to be collected using standardized templates for easy comparison of empirical results across countries.

My sense is that this proposal will face some substantial political opposition, but the Commission has an impressive track record on getting its proposals adopted by the Parliament and Council. If and when this thing is adopted, I'm sure European authorities will have no trouble finding US restructuring professionals eager to volunteer to visit Europe to provide the type of training to judges, administrators, and practitioners mandated by this Directive. Put my name on the list!

Payday Lending Regulation: The Substitution Effect?

A common argument made against regulating small dollar credit products like payday loans is that regulation does nothing to address demand for credit, so consumers will simply substitute their consumption from payday loans to other products:  overdraft, title loans, refund anticipation loans, pawn shops, etc. The substitution hypothesis is taken as a matter of faith, but there's surprisingly little evidence one way or the other about it (the Slips' own Angie Littwin has an nice contribution to the literature).  

The substitution hypothesis is prominently featured in a New York Times piece that is rather dour about the CFPB"s proposed payday rulemaking. Curiously, the article omits any mention of the evidence that the CFPB itself has adduced about the substitution hypothesis. The CFPB examined consumer behavior after banks ceased their "deposit advance programs" (basically bank payday lending) in response to regulatory guidance. There's a lot of data in the report, but the bottom line is that it finds little evidence of substitution from DAPs to overdraft, to payday, or even to bouncing checks. The one thing the CFPB data examine is substitution to pawn shop lending.  A recent paper by Neil Bhutta et al. finds evidence of substitution to pawn lending, but not to other types of lending, when payday loans are banned. I'd suggest that we're more likely to see a different substitution:  from short-term payday loans (45 days or less) to longer-term installment loans. That's not necessarily a bad thing...if the regulations are well-crafted to ensure that lenders aren't able to effectively recreate short-term payday loans through clever structuring of installment loans. For example, a lender could offer a 56-day loan with four bi-weekly installment payments, but with a "deferral fee" or "late fee" offered for deferring the first three bi-weekly payments. That's the same as four 14-day loans that rollover, and the "late fee" wouldn't be included in the APR.  That's perhaps an even better structure for payday lenders than they currently have.) The bigger point here is this:  even if we think that there will be substitution, not all substitution is the same, and to the extent that the substitution is to more consumer-friendly forms of credit, that's good.

Puerto Rico: PROMESA and Presiding Judges

H.R. 5278, containing debt restructuring authority and an oversight board for Puerto Rico, inched closer to passage after yesterday's approval by the House Natural Resources Committee. A combination of Rs and Ds rejected amendments that would have unraveled the compromise (scroll here for the amendments and their fates). They indicated an appreciation for the automatic stay, for the downsides of exempting classes of debt from impairment, and even for the assumption of risk taken by recent bond purchasers (bond disclosures quoted!). The discussion reflected the creditor-versus-creditor elements of the problem and the need for a legal mechanism to discourage holdouts and encourage compromise. Even though they have been asked not to call it "bankruptcy" (or to say "control board"), it was clear they know the restructuring provisions come from Title 11 of the U.S. Code.   

Given that derivation, many judges on the merit-selected bankruptcy bench could admirably handle the first-ever PROMESAnkruptcy, drawing on their directly-relevant experiences with large chapter 11s, if not chapter 9s.  

But section 308 of H.R. 5278 prevents that, and the Natural Resources Committee, in light of its jurisdiction, may not have been in the best position to appreciate the resulting risks.