Premium Essay

Bankruptcy

In: Business and Management

Submitted By moosenutz89
Words 850
Pages 4
Article Critique #3 June 7, 2013

Walsh, M. (2013). A County in Alabama Strikes a Bankruptcy Deal. New York: The New York Times Company.

This article reports how a county in Alabama is dealing with bankruptcy and how it will handle the situation. Due to a sewer debt shot up during the financial turmoil of 2008, and the repayment schedules accelerated sharply, it left Jefferson County unable to pay. The repairs went unfinished as well. According to the article, the county also had other debt outstanding when it declared bankruptcy, for a total of $4.2 billion, making it the biggest municipal bankruptcy in United States history. Residents of the county are worried that the bankruptcy will make their property values lower and higher taxes for county services. Governmental bankruptcies are rare and usually involve small single-purpose authorities and districts, not large, complicated counties with a lot of debt. Experts in public finance have been watching Jefferson County closely to see what kind of legal precedent it will set. Some were concerned that the successful application of Chapter 9 bankruptcy rules to municipal debt could cast a pall over the municipal bond market. The article states that the refinancing agreement covers debt held by creditors that include JPMorgan Chase, which holds about $1.22 billion of the sewer debt, the biggest block; three bond insurers; and seven hedge funds, according to a term sheet circulated in a meeting of the county commission on Tuesday. The terms call for these creditors to receive about $1.84 billion for the $2.4 billion of debt they now hold. The concessions were weighted most heavily toward JPMorgan, the term sheet said, "to increase the recovery of other sewer creditors." The bank is giving up $842

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