Restructuring & Insolvency

The administrators of Virgin Australia will not have to pay the troubled carrier’s aircraft and other lease payments, after a court granted them a temporary exemption from liability.

Voluntary administration was the only option for Virgin, and the extraordinary circumstances surrounding the airline’s decline could present a unique opportunity for the administrators to push the boundaries of corporations law, according to insolvency experts.

The High Court will not hear a challenge to a ruling that found two companies previously run by Joseph “Diamond Joe” Gutnik and his family were insolvent.

A court has upheld two decisions by the Australian Government Takeovers Panel that a bid by asset manager Aurora Funds Management to replace Molopo Energy’s directors was made in “unacceptable circumstances”.

Embattled Virgin Australia has entered voluntary administration after the Morrison government knocked back its plea for a $1.4 billion lifeline, the airline confirmed Tuesday.

Two barristers facing professional misconduct allegations in relation to the Banksia securities class action submitted more than $2.65 million in legal bills without documentation more than five years after the class action was filed and may have done so at the behest of funder Mark Elliott, a court has heard.

Camping goods retailer Aussie Disposals has entered voluntary administration, blaming the summer bushfires and the coronavirus pandemic for its fate.

Administrators of collapsed retailer Colette by Colette Hayman will not have to pay over $714,000 in rent after court ruled that a temporary rent freeze in light of the COVID-19 crisis was in the interests of the company’s creditors.

WA-based land developer Tina Bazzo and her partner Allen Caratti have failed in their challenge to a ruling that liquidators’ examinations should not be held in private despite a large scale ongoing criminal investigation of the pair.

A liquidator who ‘provoked litigation’ must personally pay the costs of the proceedings brought by a creditor of defunct company Azmac because of his ‘unreasonable’ handling of the company’s liquidation, a court has found.