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Corporate insolvency procedures in England: the uneasy case for liquidations

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  • Régis Blazy

    (EM Strasbourg Business School, IEP Strasbourg, LARGE)

  • Nirjhar Nigam

    (ICN Business School, CEREFIGE and LARGE)

Abstract

Our paper investigates a comprehensive sample of 574 English corporate insolvency cases, including direct liquidation cases. In contrast to other insolvency procedures, liquidations perform poorly on average and fail to produce satisfactory repayments to creditors. We run multinomial Logit regressions to explain the choice between liquidation and reorganization. We obtain three main results. First, we confirm that size matters: distressed firms owning low assets have higher chances of being liquidated immediately. Second, the presence of secured creditors decreases the risk of direct liquidation. This provides a clue that in England, the most-informed creditors adapt their strategies and turn away from the less-performing procedures. Third, we find that the likelihood of administration—which appears nowadays as the main alternative to direct liquidation—significantly depends on the proportion of fixed/current assets owned by the firms.

Suggested Citation

  • Régis Blazy & Nirjhar Nigam, 2019. "Corporate insolvency procedures in England: the uneasy case for liquidations," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 47(1), pages 89-123, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:ejlwec:v:47:y:2019:i:1:d:10.1007_s10657-018-9599-2
    DOI: 10.1007/s10657-018-9599-2
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    3. Alessandro Danovi & Iacopo Donati & Ilaria Forestieri & Tommaso Orlando & Andrea Zorzi, 2020. "Business continuity in times of distress: debt restructuring agreements and compositions with creditors in Italy," Questioni di Economia e Finanza (Occasional Papers) 574, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Liquidation; Reorganization; Receivership; Administration; Corporate insolvency; England;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G33 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Bankruptcy; Liquidation
    • G38 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Government Policy and Regulation
    • K20 - Law and Economics - - Regulation and Business Law - - - General
    • K22 - Law and Economics - - Regulation and Business Law - - - Business and Securities Law

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