Bankruptcy

The practice is represented in key Russian rankings: Pravo-300 in 2024 (Bankruptcy: Mid Market Disputes - Band II), Kommersant in 2024 (Bankruptcy of Legal Entities: Mid Market - Band 1), and in international rankings: Chambers Europe, Legal 500 EMEA, IFLR1000.

The team of KIAP associates is ready to provide legal assistance in any issues arising both directly in bankruptcy proceedings and prior to commencement of the case, no matter which side of the bankruptcy the Principal is taking.


Namely, we are prepared to aid in the following areas:

·         Comprehensive litigation in a bankruptcy case on the side of a debtor or creditor

·         Inclusion of claims in the register of claims of the debtor’s creditors

·         Challenging the debtor’s transactions on the creditor side or defending against such challenging on the defendant’s side

·         Initiation of or defense against vicarious liability of persons controlling the debtor on the defendant’s side

·         Structuring of pre-bankruptcy transactions

·         Pre-bankruptcy audit: analysis of the company’s transactions for their challengeability, assessing the risks of initiating vicarious liability against controlling persons and/or recovery of losses and formation of a strategy to minimize the identified risks



Ilya Ischuk
Partner
Ph.D in Law
Attorney at law
Daniil Zherdev
Senior Associate
Attorney at law
Dmitry Kazankov
Senior Associate
Tamara Fillinykh
Junior Associate
Rustam Bolshakov
Junior Associate
INCLUSION OF CLAIMS IN THE REGISTER OF CREDITORS’ CLAIMS
The Principal entered into a number of interrelated contracts with a contractor to implement a project on construction of a shopping and entertainment center in Moscow Region. The Contractor breached its obligations under the contracts, thus the Principal incurred losses by way of extra costs for re-design, additional mobilization of forces and construction work, as well as by lost profits due...
16 July 2024 Ilya Ischuk, Daniil Zherdev
As part of the bankruptcy case, a creditor’s application was handled that concerned inclusion in the register of creditors’ claims of the amount of RUB 280 million received by the debtor under loan agreements. Since doubts existed that the debt was real, KIAP was tasked with verifying the evidence and opposing inclusion of the debt in the register. In their efforts, KIAP associates...
CHALLENGING OF TRANSACTIONS
In a citizen’s bankruptcy case, a marriage contract surfaced, under the terms and conditions of which, in the event of dissolving the marriage at the discretion of the debtor, the title to ¾ of all the marital property of the spouses would transfer in favor of the wife. Based on preliminary estimates, such a deviation from the general rule established by family law could have resulted in damag...
The bankruptcy case examination revealed loan agreements between the debtor and an affiliated person totaling to more than RUB 600 million. KIAP was tasked with litigation in challenging said transactions and obtaining their invalidation. The court of first instance refused to recognize the transactions as invalid, deeming that, at the time of challenging, the transactions did not ...
VICARIOUS LIABILITY
As part of the company’s bankruptcy case, the bankruptcy trustee established grounds for bringing the company’s CEO and sole member to vicarious liability. Having joined the case, KIAP associates also identified a bunch of transactions and circumstances proving existence of another person controlling the debtor - the CEO’s wife, who was later engaged in as a co-defendant. KIAP associate...
16 July 2024 Ilya Ischuk, Daniil Zherdev
KIAP associates joined the Principal’s defense when the dispute had been pending for eighteen months already. The main problem was that the bankruptcy trustee challenged the transactions as damaging to the creditor, the total amount of which amounted to nearly 40% of the register of creditors’ claims. Moreover, the Principal had no documents that would enable its protection from being held lia...
16 July 2024 Ilya Ischuk
PRE-BANKRUPTCY AUDIT
KIAP associates were given the task of conducting an in-depth audit for business of a company on the verge of potential bankruptcy. The core goal of the audit was to identify transactions exposed to the risk of being challenged in bankruptcy, as well as to identify the risks of bringing controlling persons to vicarious liability and recovering losses from them. In the outcome of the ana...
16 July 2024