Tausi Insider

Turmoil in the cryptocurrency industry has rattled major exchanges and sent the value of digital assets tumbling, but at least one group stands to gain: bankruptcy lawyers. High-profile bankruptcies involving crypto exchange FTX, hedge fund Three Arrows Capital and crypto lenders BlockFi, Celsius Network and Voyager Digital Ltd are generating new opportunities – and big fees – for law firms that counsel troubled companies. Large law firms can rake in more than $100-million in legal fees during a long-running bankruptcy, experts said. “You’ve got to pay the gravedigger,” said Adam Levitin, a law professor at Georgetown University who specializes in bankruptcy law. “These are complicated cases with a bunch of novel issues, and it shouldn’t be surprising that they are going to require a lot of attorney involvement.” The value of bitcoin has dropped 65 per cent so far this year, dragging down other crypto assets and leaving investors reeling. The spectacular implosion of FTX last month s...

Freeport LNG on Friday again delayed the restart of the second-biggest U.S. liquefied natural gas (LNG) export facility, moving its forecast for resuming processing to year’s end, pending regulatory approval. Freeport shut down the Texas plant on June 8 after an explosion energy consultants said was the result of inadequate operating and testing procedures, error and fatigue. Last month, the closely-held company said it was on track to restart the plant in mid December and would get most of its 15 million tonnes per annum production back by January with a return to full service in March. “Based upon current progress, and subject to us continuing to meet necessary regulatory requirements, we now anticipate that the restart of our liquefaction facility to be achieved around year end,” Freeport LNG spokesperson Heather Browne told Reuters in an e-mail. A delayed restart of the plant would leave less fuel for European countries seeking to replace Russian gas. Russia has slashed exports t...

A group of media companies is set to argue on Friday to the U.S. judge overseeing the FTX bankruptcy that they should be allowed to request that the collapsed crypto exchange make public the names of its customers. In seeking to intervene in the case, the New York Times, Dow Jones, Bloomberg and the Financial Times said bankruptcy law demands transparency. Letting customer names remain secret could turn bankruptcy proceedings into a “farce” if creditors start fighting anonymously over how much money they should get, the media companies wrote in a Delaware bankruptcy court filing. FTX has argued the usual U.S. bankruptcy practice of disclosing names, addresses and e-mail addresses of creditors, which includes customers, could expose them to scams and could violate privacy laws for those who live in Europe. The company has also said that disclosing identities of as many as 1 million customers would make it easier for a competitor to poach them, undermining the value of FTX’s platform w...

Canada-based miner First Quantum Minerals Ltd. FM-T would suspend a “significant amount” of jobs at its operations in Panama if the Central American government forces it to halt operations during a contract dispute, the company said in a letter. “If we have to reduce operations to care and maintenance mode, the company will need to take steps to reduce expenditure across the business. We could be forced to suspend a significant amount of our valued workforce,” the letter sent to employees and seen by Reuters said. The company’s Cobre Panama mine generates about 40,000 direct and indirect jobs and interacts with some 1,800 suppliers, according to a consultant. First Quantum was notified on Dec. 21 of a government order for it to create a plan to halt operations within 10 working days, after it missed a deadline for a new contract due to disagreements centered on royalties and tax payments. “This is a drastic and, in our view, unnecessary step, which will potentially have a huge impact...

New York City comptroller Brad Lander and three of the city’s pension funds are offering shareholder proposals calling on several banks including Royal Bank of Canada RY-T to disclose absolute greenhouse gas emissions targets for 2030. The shareholder proposals call for an absolute reduction target aligned with a science-based net-zero emissions pathway and request a report within one year. The pension funds backing the plan are the New York City Employees’ Retirement System, Teachers’ Retirement System, and Board of Education Retirement System. The funds combined to hold 293,000 shares of Royal Bank of Canada as of November 2022. The proposals filed at Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and Royal Bank of Canada request the absolute GHG emissions targets cover lending and underwriting for oil and gas and power generation sectors. At Bank of America, the proposal co-filed with the New York State Common Retirement Fund asks the emissions reduction targets cover lending and underwriting in t...

A group of media companies is set to argue on Friday to the U.S. judge overseeing the FTX bankruptcy that they should be allowed to request that the collapsed crypto exchange make public the names of its customers. In seeking to intervene in the case, the New York Times, Dow Jones, Bloomberg and the Financial Times said bankruptcy law demands transparency. Letting customer names remain secret could turn bankruptcy proceedings into a “farce” if creditors start fighting anonymously over how much money they should get, the media companies wrote in a Delaware bankruptcy court filing. FTX has argued the usual U.S. bankruptcy practice of disclosing names, addresses and e-mail addresses of creditors, which includes customers, could expose them to scams and could violate privacy laws for those who live in Europe. The company has also said that disclosing identities of as many as 1 million customers would make it easier for a competitor to poach them, undermining the value of FTX’s platform w...