OhMyGod thanks for your post!
I had basically given up, it was really painful. But without a legal team what can one expect.
I received a package from the trustee today, I have been asked by the trustee to contact him and in his letter he asks if there was a forum to communicate with what he calls the ATP unsecured creditors.
Because he asks for information on a forum to communicate and his letter is not marked confidential please find the following letter to me.
Dear Mr. Meyer,
I am the Chapter 7 bankruptcy trustee for ATP. Since you were an active unsecured creditor in this estate I would like you to contact me at your earliest convenience.
I recently filed a motion for use of cash collateral seeking to use $345,000 of funds to pay for the expenses on the Israeli gas interests so the estate could proceed with its investment. The motion advised the Court that the estate would need to use $4 million of the BP funds to pay our portion of the first well and another $4 million for the second well. I advised the Court that I was hoping the timing of the need to use the funds would correspond to the next two BP payments which will come in October 2017 and October 2018. At the hearing the Court was emphatic that he would not allow me to make a speculative investment of estate funds for this project and that I needed to sell the interest.
It is clear that if I sell this interest now the unsecured creditors will get nothing. In fact, the DIP lenders will not be paid in full either. I explained to the Court that in order to protect a potential recovery for the unsecured creditors I need to take this asset through both drillings. I told him that a sale now would guarantee that the unsecureds would receive nothing. He stated that there was less than a 1% chance he would approve the investment, that if I wanted to do something like that then I would have to convert the case to a chapter 11 and then he believed there would only be a 4% chance he would approve it. In other words, the chance is bleak.
If the first well is successful the value of this asset increases exponentially. If the second well is successful, it is likely the unsecured creditors would receive something unless the figure of $500 million being owed to Chapter 11 administrative expenses is correct, which I doubt but that issue may have to be litigated.
There are fields surrounding the Daniels East, Daniels West, and the Shimshon that have been successful. I've enclosed some data gathered by my engineer regarding these fields.
Is there a forum to communicate with ATP unsecured creditors? I would like to communicate with as many ATP unsecured creditors as possible to see if there is a way this asset can be preserved for the potential benefit of unsecured creditors. If the Court will not let me use estate funds for this purpose, it is possible he may agree to the use of non-estate funds. I did a quick calculation and realized that if all unsecured creditors participated in the effort to raise the funds necessary to drill these wells, assuming $1.25 billion in unsecured creditors, the investment would be about $70.00 per $100,000.00 of original investment.
Whether the investment comes from the unsecured pool or elsewhere I don't care, so long as I can try to preserve this asset's value for the benefit of unsecured creditors. If we remove the speculative use of estate funds and replace it with the speculative use of third party funds then maybe we can get this through whether it is in a chapter 7 or a chapter 11. I can move to convert to a chapter 11 if l can work something out. However, in a chapter 11 we will need votes to approve a plan.
Those details can be worked out later. The purpose of this email is to try to help you as an unsecured creditor. If this effort does not work then I will have to sell all or part of the interest. At today's value a sale of the entire interest will not be at a price that can make a return to unsecured creditors.
What I want to do is work out a mechanism to try to help the unsecured creditors. The forum or just emails may work. Please let me know if you think you can help.
I want to emphasize, there is absolutely no certainty I can organize anything that will work but I'm willing to try.
Yours truly,
Rodney Tow
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