Corporate Restructuring and Insolvency

Recommended Prerequisites

Previous knowledge of Company Law, Labour Law; Business Evaluation, Financial Analysis and Accounting is recommended.

Teaching Methods

An interdisciplinary approach and an experimental methodology are favoured. Different diagnoses that portray various situations of business crisis will be presented to the students, which will serve to i) enhance their financial-accounting analysis, ii) introduce the theoretical contents and the legal framework of restructuring and insolvency, iii) design and test possible solutions to respond to these diagnoses. Additionally, through some talks, he contact of students with professionals in the area of business recovery and insolvency is promoted in order to bring greater contact with practice.

Learning Outcomes

Just as it is important to teach how to create and maintain successful companies, it is also useful to teach how to recognise and deal with their difficulties.  This course aims to provide students with practical knowledge about the legal mechanisms aimed at the restructuring of enterprises in economic and financial difficulties or their insolvency. Students must become familiar with: i) the judicial and extrajudicial solutions aimed at the restructuring of corporate and non-corporate companies, their requirements and effects, and their basic procedure; ii) the functioning and consequences of the insolvency procedure, the procedural actors, their role, and their rights and duties. Students are expected to mobilise their financial, accounting and legal knowledge in order to identify situations that threaten business sustainability and act with a view to obtaining its recovery or, in the limit, its winding-up.

Work Placement(s)

No

Syllabus

1. introduction

1.1 Overview of business diagnostic tools and ICT support

1.2 Early warning systems

1.3 Business crisis, restructuring and insolvency

2. Corporate restructuring

2.1 Extrajudicial and hybrid restructuring: the RERE and the PER solutions

2.2 Court-supervised restructuring: the insolvency plan

2.3 Other restructuring mechanisms

3. The insolvency regime

3.1 The insolvency of corporations

3.2 The insolvency of non-corporate businesses

3.3 The case for transborder insolvencies 

Head Lecturer(s)

Catarina Cláudia Ferreira Frade

Assessment Methods

Assessment
Periodic or by final exam as given in the course information: 100.0%

Bibliography

Epifânio, M. R. (2022), Manual de Direito da Insolvência, 8ª ed. Coimbra: Almedina

Fernandes, C. et al. (20), Análise Financeira. Teoria e Prática. Aplicação no âmbito do SNC, 6ª ed. Lisboa: Sílabo

Gameiro, A. R.; Costa, N. M. e Pimentel, L. M. (2019), Manual de Contabilidade para Juristas, Coimbra: Almedina

Garrido, J. et al (2021), Restructuring and Insolvency in Europe: Policy Options in the Implementation of the EU Directive, IMF Working Paper WP/21/157

Martins, A. S. (2022), Um Curso de Direito da Insolvência, vol I, 4.ª ed. Coimbra: Almedina

Serra, C. (2021), Lições de Direito da Insolvência, 2ª ed., Coimbra: Almedina