Stanner: Man, may your wishes come true! Hitting 2.50 on the pps anytime in the near/forseeable future would be a long-awaited 10-bagger for me! And with 2 girls in the house -17, and 7 months - that'd be tuition and Fall clothing for my teen, plenty of diapers and formula for the baby, with enough left over for me to pick up some Depends!
You are right not to trust Blackstone. They are hired guns, and if Citi is footing the bill for their services (btw: do they perform FORENSIC accountancy?), there's no doubt but that the assessment will be slanted/biased in the DIP's favor.
I think, also, that to hang yr hat and hopes on the luck of the draw in getting a "good" or "fair" judge to have this BK on his/her docket, is to over-endow the judge presiding over this with Judge Judy powers, e.g., taking aggressive actions and ripping the TBTF boys a new a-hole, initiating areas for discovery, and rendering decisions based on an empathic sense of protectionism for "the little guy"/retail shareholders. Having seen how judges can be held hostage by the manipulative skill-sets of BK counsel, it is important to be aware of the fact that it is really the DIP's presentation - or lack of presentation - of their argument that the judge can react to. S/he cannot introduce anything that isn't put forward, and cannot rule on anything that is not introduced as being evidentiary-based. The judge is REactive, not proactive. And as I mentioned in an earlier post somewhere, the "fairness" level that needs to be met under BK law for a POR to be approved - whether that POR is inclusive of having equity survive or not - is very meager, and meant to protect the debt and bond holders, shareholders be damned. If there is enough left after the waterfall of debt ands bond holders being paid in full, then that would trickle down to equity. But usually the DIP tries to get equity cancelled, even if it means manipulating the assets and liabilities accountancy and then crafting the POR's waterfall so that it stops just short of equity.
It's a nasty bit of litigation. I've witnessed it, nefarious and naked, played out in other BKs.
Dion
"Time, and patience."
-- General Kutuzov, Tolstoy's "War and Peace".
AI
