Malcom Bell given six years prison time
Malcom Bell, the 45-year-old Illinois hedge fund manager who helped facilitate the recent Petters Co. Inc. fraud scheme, has been sentenced this week in federal court to six years in prison.Bell owned a fund called Lancelot Investment Management, which invested all of...
Blockbuster, the movie-rental company giant, has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
Blockbuster, the movie-rental company giant, has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The move allows the company to secure $125 million in debtor-in-possession financing to help keep operations stable while the reorganization takes place.In the Thursday announcement...
Alabama unemployment rate drops
Alabama’s unemployment rate dropped to 9.2 percent in August, from 9.7 percent in July. This is the first time that Alabama’s rate has fallen below the national average — 9.6 percent — in more than a year.The Birmingham-Hoover metro area’s rate fell by a smaller...
Feds release latest Beige Book reports
The U.S. Federal Reserve’s latest Beige Book survey, released Wednesday, suggests that the economies of most states have expanded “modestly” in the past six weeks. The information in the Beige Book is anecdotal rather than statistical, and is collected from a sample...
Nationwide bankruptcy filings reach highest in years
According to government data released last Wednesday, bankruptcy filings between April and June of 2010 reached the highest levels seen in the last five years. The number of filings represents an increase of 11 percent from the same time period in 2009.422,061 filings...
Alabama’s bankruptcy rate fifth highest in the nation
According to the American Bankruptcy Institute, Alabama’s bankruptcy rate is the fifth highest in the nation.A researcher said that Alabama has 7.42 bankruptcy filing per 1,000 residents. The national average is at 5.05 and Nevada had the highest rate of all the 50...
Foreclosures falling slightly in Birmingham
In a report by the mortgage researcher RealtyTrac, metro Birmingham seems to be seeing the beginnings of a decline in foreclosure rates.In the first six months of 2010, there were 4,857 foreclosure filings- equivalent to one in every 104 housing units. This is a...
Nexity’s Holding Company Files for Bankruptcy
Bloomberg reports that Nexity Financial Corp. has filed for bankruptcy. According to Bloomberg, “The Birmingham, Alabama-based company listed both assets and debt of as much as $50 million today in Chapter 11 documents in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington,...
Properties Abandoned by Owners, Now Lenders
The Wall Street Journal reports that, across the country, home values are falling well below the price of the mortgage. Many of these owners are abandoning the properties. According to The Wall Street Journal, “Now, in the case of one defunct mortgage lender, the...
Bankruptcy Filing Rates for Consumers Reach High Point
According to Emmeline Zhao of The Wall Street Journal, “Consumer bankruptcy filings reached their highest point since 2005 in the first half of this year.” In the first sixth months of 2010, there was a 14 percent increase in filings compared to the same time period...
Bankrupt Funeral Home Sold
Al.com reports that “bankrupt Bessemer Funeral Home will be sold to a new company that has promised to honor all burial contracts, according to testimony at a court hearing Wednesday.”The company’s old owner, Elizabeth Anne Modder Wallace, formed a new company to buy...
Bankruptcy judge requires Texas Rangers to change bankruptcy plan
The Texas Rangers’ reorganization plan was challenged in bankruptcy court earlier this week. According to court reports, a bankruptcy judge said that while the lenders cannot veto a sale they do have a say in the sale process.As a result of the ruling, the current...
Corus Bankshares Inc. files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy
Corus Bankshares Inc. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy earlier this week. According to court reports, the case was filed in the Northern District of Illinois Bankruptcy Court.Corus Bankshares Inc. was a holding company that had its bank transferred to MB Financial Inc....
Pacific Ethanol subsidiaries releases reorganization plan
Pacific Ethanol subsidiaries will emerge from bankruptcy. According to court reports, the subsidiaries of Pacific Ethanol, Inc. will reorganize as Pacific Ethanol Holding Co., LLC.The reorganization plan was approved by the firms’ secured lenders. The plan will...
Midway Games reaches agreement with creditors’ committee in Chapter 11
Midway Games continued its liquidating Chapter 11 plan this past week. According to court reports, the company’s creditors’ committee agreed to settle claims against the company’s owner Summer Redstone.The settlement will likely allow unsecured creditors to recover 25...
Credit card delinquency decreases nationwide
A recent TransUnion report shows that the number of people who were late in making their credit card payments in the first quarter this year has decreased as compared to the previous quarter.Credit card delinquency is highest in Nevada, at 1.79 percent, with Florida...
Movie Gallery Inc. to shut down operations
The Wilsonville, Ore.-based Movie Gallery Inc. announced plans last Friday to close the remaining 1,900 Hollywood Video stores and liquidate its operations in the U.S.The company filed the notice in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Virginia in...
Nationwide foreclosures down
According to a recent report by RealtyTrac Inc., foreclosure filings have finally begun to level off nationwide.Filings are down 2 percent overall nationwide, with certain states like New York seeing drops as large as 20 percent. April is the first month of the year...
Six Flags recovers from bankruptcy
New York City-based Six Flags Inc. this week emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy with the backing of a new shareholders group. The company, which owns the amusement parks of the same name, will now be known as Six Flags Entertainment Corp. following the $725 million in...
National mall operator emerges from bankruptcy
General Growth Properties Inc., the nationwide mall operator, filed a motion to emerge from Chapter 11 bankruptcy last week with a federal bankruptcy court in New York.The Chicago-based mall operator has received a $6.55 billion investment from Fairholme Capital...
Foreclosure numbers increase nationwide
A RealtyTrac Inc. report has revealed a rising trend in home foreclosure filings. One in 465 homes in the Houston, TX, area was foreclosed on in March, a number that is 53 percent higher than last year’s March filings. The number of homes that recieved foreclosure...