Sponsored practice area spotlight: Insolvency and restructuring: Combining unique skills to achieve a successful outcome

Insolvency and restructuring proceedings are intricate and complex. Practitioners must be able to combine legal knowledge, in particular in the areas of litigation, finance and transactions, with strategic, tactical and managerial skills to deliver positive results.

Prager Dreifuss has extensive experience and a longstanding tradition in insolvency and restructuring matters. In the wake of the financial crisis, we combined our finance and bankruptcy knowledge which enabled us to assist in complex project financing, also lately in a major multinational commodity project. Our attorneys regularly represent creditors, some of which are banks, hedge funds or other financial institutions, in large national and international insolvency and restructuring proceedings, whether in registering or purchasing claims or in enforcing disputed claims vis-à-vis bankruptcy administrators and before courts. Assisting clients in the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments in Switzerland and abroad is a key feature of our daily practice. Frequently and increasingly, we are retained by creditors in enforcing claims (awards, bonds) against sovereigns.

With its more than 40 lawyers and a total of approximately 80 employees at our offices in Zürich, Berne and Brussels, Prager Dreifuss is one of the leading Swiss law firms. With the ability to draw on additional specialised experience within the firm ranging from M&A, dispute resolution, banking and finance to insurance law, private clients and tax, Prager Dreifuss is ideally placed to offer clients a comprehensive range of required legal services in addition to the representation in bankruptcy-related matters and effective and innovative solutions adapted to the legal and economic realities of complex challenges.

The Prager Dreifuss insolvency and restructuring team is led by Daniel Hayek. The team consists of three partners (Daniel Hayek, Gion Jegher, Gion Christian Casanova) and a number of highly skilled associates (Mark Meili, Rahel Nedi, Laura Oegerli and Livio Chiesa).

In as far as necessary and suited for a client matter, we are able to form a tailored team of partners and lawyers of varying seniority to manage any insolvency and restructuring case that is entrusted to us.

With our wide network of insolvency and restructuring experts in other major jurisdictions (US, EU, Asia etc) we also ensure that all aspects of complex multinational bankruptcy proceedings are duly taken into consideration at an early stage. This may encompass, inter alia, asset tracing and asset recovery, mutual legal assistance, piercing the corporate veil of offshore companies and/or trusts, possible barriers to enforcement whether national or international etc. Prager Dreifuss also maintains active ties to liquidators and bankruptcy administrators, which has proven helpful in reaching settlement agreements.

Recent work undertaken by this team includes, among others, advising the bondholders vis-à-vis the insolvent Petroplus group, including, but not limited to, Petroplus Marketing, the key entity of the insolvent Petroplus group, and Petroplus Holdings AG (the top holding of the group). The two most relevant Petroplus group entities with the most assets are thus located in Switzerland. Prager Dreifuss has further been working on the bankruptcy cases of Lehman Brothers. We have been involved in litigation emanating from agreements to finance or hedge assets of the debtor. Further, we have been involved in claims contesting the schedule of claims amounting to several hundred million dollars due to terminated and failed syndicated loans and over-the-counter derivatives contracts based on ISDA Master Agreements. Prager Dreifuss was successful in terminating these cases by way of an amicable settlement.

Prager Dreifuss is the lead counsel to the majority holders of bonds issued by a major Italian bank, which is currently undergoing a restructuring process. We have the lead in supporting the clients’ efforts to prevent expropriating measures and we are working with lawyers in various EU jurisdictions on this matter. The case also deals with the EU Banking Recovery and Resolution Directive and the EU Commission’s Banking Communication, giving any litigation in this matter significant publicity as a test case in this field.

Prager Dreifuss is consistently ranked as an outstanding firm worldwide by leading publications, including Chambers, The Legal 500, IFLR1000 and Who’s Who Legal.