New Chapter 11 Filing - Marsh Supermarkets Holding LLC

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Marsh Supermarkets Holding LLC

  • 5/11/17 Recap: After weeks of rumors and run-up, another Sun Capital Partners portfolio company has filed for bankruptcy with the hope of selling its remaining 44 locations to a buyer. A buyer is not currently lined up. The company cited the usual reasons for the filing: (a) the increasingly competitive grocery space with mega-retailers and specialty chains crowding the market, and (b) falling produce and retail food prices. We're frankly surprised that they didn't bother to mention Amazon like everyone else. When it doubt, "Amazon Effect" it. But we digress. Anyway, it also noted that capital investment (particularly relating to technological advances) trailed big players like Kroger ($KR) and Meijer. While those players reaped the benefits of their heavy investments, Marsh could not keep up, foot traffic declined, revenue suffered, and liquidity constraints increased. This is pretty basic sh*t. 
  • Jurisdiction: D. of Delaware
  • Capital Structure: $60mm RCF debt ($5.2mm funded + $2.5mm LOC)(Wells Fargo Bank NA), $25.7mm June 2016 junior note, $6.3mm October 2016 junior note    
  • Company Professionals:
    • Legal: Young Conaway Stargatt & Taylor LLP (Robert Brady, Michael Nestor, Robert Poppiti Jr., Ashley Jacobs, Shane Reil)
    • Financial Advisor/CRO: Clear Thinking Group LLC (Lee Diercks, Anthony Gehringer, A.R. Williams, Thomas Burke)
    • Investment Banker: Peter J. Soloman Company (Scott Moses, Derek Pitts, Greg Grambling, Brandon Yoshimura, Dan Stolar)
    • Liquidator: Hilco Merchant Resources
      • Legal: Pepper Hamilton LLP (Douglas Hermann, Michael Custer)
    • Real Estate Advisor: Hilco Real Estate LLC (Ryan Lawlor)
    • Claims Agent: Prime Clerk LLC (*click on company name above for free docket access)
  • Other Parties in Interest:
    • Senior Lien Agent: Wells Fargo Bank NA
      • Legal: Otterbourg PC (Jonathan Helfat, Daniel Fiorillo)
    • Junior Noteholder: Marsh Group Finance LLC
      • Legal: Kirkland & Ellis LLP (James Stempel) & (local) Morris Nichols Arsht & Tunnell LLP (Curtis Miller)
    • Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors
      • Legal: Cooley LLP (Cathy Hershcopf, Seth Van Aalten, Robert Winning, Max Schlan, Sarah Carnes) & (local) Bayard PA (Justin Alberto, Erin Fay, Gregory Flasser)
      • Financial Advisor: FTI Consulting Inc. (Conor Tully)

Updated 7/12/17

New Chapter 11 Filing - Nuverra Environmental Solutions Inc.

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Nuverra Environmental Solutions Inc.

  • 5/1/17 Recap: Once publicly-traded Arizona-based environmental solutions provider (obviously) to oil and natural gas shale-oriented energy and exploration companies filed for chapter 11 to delever its balance sheet pursuant to a restructuring support agreement and prepackaged plan of reorganization agreed to by its major lenders. The company seeks approval of a $31.5mm DIP to fund the cases. The term lenders will receive equity, cash, and board seats, the '21 noteholders 99.75% of the reorganized equity and the '18 noteholders will get the remainder (subject to a rights offering post-confirmation and a management incentive plan...of course). And as you might expect, the equityholders stand to recover bupkis. 
  • Jurisdiction: D. of Delaware
  • Capital Structure: $24.6mm ABL (funded - Wells Fargo Bank NA), $80mm TL, $327mm 12.5%/10% '21 senior secured second lien notes, $40.4mm '18 9.875% unsecured senior notes (Bank of New York Mellon Trust Company NA, replaced by Wilmington Trust Savings Fund Society FSB) 
  • Company Professionals:
    • Legal: Shearman & Sterling LLP (Douglas Bartner, Fredric Sosnick, Sara Coelho, Stephen Blank) & (local) Young Conaway Stargatt & Taylor LLP (Pauline Morgan, Kenneth Enos, Jamie Luton Chapman)
    • Financial Advisor/CRO: AlixPartners LLC (Robert Albergotti, Dan Kelsall)
    • Investment Banker: Lazard Middle Market LLC (Andrew Torgove)
    • Claims Agent: Prime Clerk LLC (*click on company name above for free docket access)
  • Other Parties in Interest:
    • Ad Hoc Group of '21 Supporting Noteholders
      • Legal: Fried Frank Harris Shriver & Jacobson LLP (Brad Scheler, Jennifer Rodburg, Carl Stapen) & Pachulski Stang Ziehl & Jones LLP (Laura Davis Jones, Peter Keane)
    • RCF Agent: Wells Fargo Bank NA
      • Legal: Goldberg Kohn Ltd. (Randall Klein, Dimitri Karcazes, Gary Zussman, Jacob Marshall) & (local) DLA Piper LLP (Stuart Brown, Daniel Brogan)
    • Trustee to '21 Senior Secured Second Lien Notes & TL Agent: Wilmington Savings Fund Society FSB
      • Legal: Morrison & Foerster LLP (Jonathan Levine, James Newton) & (local) Morris James LLP (Eric Monzo) 
    • Term Lenders: Ascribe Capital LLC, Gates Capital Management Inc.
    • Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors
      • Legal: Kilpatrick Townsend & Stockton LLP (Todd Meyers, Paul Rosenblatt, Jonathan Polonsky, Michael Langford, Lindsey Simon) & (local) Landis Rath & Cobb LLP (Richard Cobb, Matthew McGuire, Travis Ferguson, Matthew Pierce)
      • Financial Advisor: Batuta Capital Advisors LLC (Alexandre Zyngier)

Updated 7/13/17 1:56 am CT

New Chapter 11 Filing - Ciber Inc.

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Ciber Inc.

  • 4/10/17 Recap: Once publicly-traded Colorado-based IT staffing and consulting services company filed for bankruptcy to pursue a sale of its business to CapGemini S.A., as stalking horse bidder, for at least $50mm plus the assumption of certain liabilities. The sale is subject to a postpetition marketing process. Ciber lists Microsoft and Oracle as major corporate partners; it sells and supports both companies' product offerings. Ciber seems like the quintessential go-big-or-go-home kind of company. It fueled growth over the years with over 60 acquisitions at a cost of more than $1b, never fully integrating the new businesses. This failure to integrate led to some AWESOME results: like the time the company paid $14mm to European consultants for NEGATIVE PERFORMANCE. And we thought Wells Fargo had a monopoly on stupid bonus-based behavior. Speaking of Wells Fargo, it is the lender here and the straw that broke the camel's back was the company's inability to adhere to its Fixed Coverage Charge ratio, triggering a default under its asset-based loan. Now Wells Fargo is providing the DIP facility of $41mm to fund the cases which, by our simple mathematical calculations, amounts to $4.1mm per bankruptcy lawyer who has made a notice of appearance on behalf of the debtors already (see below).
  • Jurisdiction: D. of Delaware
  • Capital Structure: $60mm ABL (Wells Fargo Bank NA)     
  • Company Professionals:
    • Legal: Morrison & Foerster LLP (Brett Miller, Dennis Jenkins, Daniel Harris, Benjamin Butterfield, Steve Rappoport, Todd Goren) & (local) Polsinelli PC (Christopher Ward, Justin Edelson, Jarrett Vine)
    • Financial Advisor/CRO: Alvarez & Marsal LLC (Jonathan Goulding, Matt Covington, Glenn Gilmour)
    • Investment Banker: Houlihan Lokey Capital Inc. (Adam Dunayer, Michael Boone)
    • Claims Agent: Prime Clerk LLC (*click on company name above for free docket access)
  • Other Parties in Interest:
    • Prepetition & DIP Lender: Wells Fargo Bank NA
      • Legal: Goldberg Kohn Ltd. (Jeremy Downs, Jacob Marshall)
    • Stalking Horse Bidder: CapGemini SA
      • Legal: Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom LLP (Paul Leake, Mark McDermott, Raquelle Kaye)
    • Actual Buyer: HTC Global Ventures LLC
      • Legal: Plunkett Cooney PC (Scott Lites, David Lerner)
    • Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors
      • Legal: Perkins Coie LLP (John Penn, Schuyler Carroll, Tina Moos) & (local) Shaw Fishman Glantz & Towbin LLC (Thomas Horan)
      • Financial Advisor: BDO Consulting (David Berliner)
    • Ad Hoc Group of Non-Insider Employees
      • Legal: Blank Rome LLP (Josef Mintz, John Lucian)

Updated 5/21/17 

  

New Chapter 11 & CCAA Filing - Payless Shoesource Inc.

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Payless Shoesource Inc.

  • 4/4/17 Recap: Private equity backed Kansas-based discount footwear retailer with over 4000 stores filed for bankruptcy because, well, right, it's a private equity backed retailer. Golden Gate Capital and Blum Capital Partners are the sponsors and we've previously covered their methods, uh, we mean "value-add" proposition. We probably won't even bother to read the filing documents because we're 98.9% confident they say the same sh*t every other retail case has said, e.g., poor e-commerce...blah blah...Amazon...blah blah...mall-based retail...blah blah...bad weather...blah blah...Showtime's Billions sucks...wait, what?...whatever, it does (who cares if that's relevant?)...millennial shopping habits...blah blah...bleeding top line and depressed comp store sales...blah blah...dividend recaps...blah blah blah. Apparently the retailer is going to close nearly 400 stores while it attempts to reorganize around what remains - all in accordance to a plan support agreement that the company has entered into with 2/3 of its term loan lenders and with the support of a $385mm DIP facility (of which $80mm is new money). Meanwhile, we'll see what kind of cascading effect this will have on (a) China's manufacturing sector which, apparently, has seen significant stretching of payables (up to 100 days) - a fact evidenced by the top 50 creditors list, and (b) our lovely "A" malls (notably, Simon Property Group made a notice of appearance before the first day pleadings were even completely filed). Finally, the CEO dropped the fact that the new business plan will focus on, among other things, "omnichannel expansion" and since that is the retail buzzword/phrase of the moment, we guess there's really nothing to see here: all will be fine. 
  • 4/6/17 Update: We read the documents and, generally speaking, everything we said above applies. Two other factors apparently worth mentioning as causes for the filing: inventory management issues (compounded by the West Coast port strikes) and foreign exchange issues.
  • Jurisdiction: E.D. of Missouri
  • Capital Structure: $300 ABL ($187mm out - Wells Fargo), $520mm '21 TL ($506mm out), $145mm '22 second lien TL (Morgan Stanley Senior Funding Inc.)    
  • Company Professionals:
    • Legal: Kirkland & Ellis LLP (James Sprayragen, Nicole Greenblatt, William Guerrieri, Christine Pirro, Jessica Kuppersmith) & (local) Armstrong Teasdale LLP (Steven Cousins, Erin Edelman) & (Canadian counsel) Osler Hoskin & Harcourt LLP 
    • Legal to Independent Director: Munger Tolles & Olson LLP (Thomas Walper, Seth Goldman, Kevin Allred)
    • Financial Advisor: Alvarez & Marsal North America LLC (Robert Campagna)
    • Investment Banker: Guggenheim Securities LLC (Morgan Suckow)
    • Real Estate: RCS Real Estate Advisors (Ivan Friedman)
    • Liquidators: Great American Group LLC & Tiger Capital Group LLC
    • Claims Agent: Prime Clerk LLC (*click on company name above for free court docket)
  • Other Parties in Interest:
    • Ad Hoc Committee of First Lien Term Lenders (Alden Global Opportunities Master Fund, Credit Suisse Asset Management, GSO Capital Partners, Hawkeye Capital Management, Invesco Senior Secured Management, Octagon Credit Investors LLC, AIC Finance, Axar Capital Management)
      • Legal: King & Spalding LLP (Michael Rupe, Christopher Boies, Jeffrey Pawlitz, Austin Jowers, Michael Handler)
      • Financial Advisor: Houlihan Lokey Capital Inc.
    • DIP ABL Agent: Wells Fargo Bank NA
      • Legal: Choate Hall & Stewart LLP (Kevin Simard, Douglas Gooding, Jonathan Marshall) & (local) Thompson Coburn LLP (Mark Bossi)
    • First Lien Agent & DIP TL Agent: Morgan Stanley Senior Funding Inc. & Cortland Products Corp.
      • Legal: Norton Rose Fulbright US LLP (Stephen Castro, David Rosenzweig, Danielle Ledford, Tim Walsh)
    • Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors
      • Legal: Pachulski Stang Ziehl & Jones LLP (Robert Feinstein, Jeffrey Pomerantz, Bradford Sandler) & (local) Polsinelli PC (Matthew Layfield, Christopher Ward, Shanti Katona)
      • Financial Advisor: Province Inc.

Updated 4/18/17