Scheming against the Schemes: A New Framework to Deal with Business Financial Distress in Spain

In Spain, the legal framework to solve the financial distress of businesses was confined to formal insolvency proceedings until recently, a number of reforms, have created a menu of options to tackle the problem out of court. The deficient results offered by formal insolvency proceedings in practice make this change commendable. The choice of out of court solution will depend on the type of debtor as well as on the kind of measurers needed to bring the business back to solvent trading. The most complete, versatile and practically relevant of the new procedures is the Homologated Refinancing Agreement. Through this vehicle, troubled-but-solvent or insolvent debtors (and groups of debtors) may restructure its business, refinance its debt or bail in its shareholders, with a minimal Court intervention. Although the design of the procedure is subject to improvement in a number of ways, it has already been used successfully to restructure a several highly relevant market participants, many with an important international component. It remains to be seen whether large corporations seeking to solve their financial distress will continue to consider buying an –economy class- ticket to England with a view to reach a scheme of arrangement with its creditors.