Source: http://ks.findacase.com/research/wfrmDocViewer.aspx/xq/fac.20180612_0000867.DKS.htm/qx
Timestamp: 2019-04-20 07:02:38+00:00

Document:
In re ABENGOA BIOENERGY BIOMASS OF KANSAS, LLC, Debtor.
On February 8, 2018, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Robert E. Nugent entered a Memorandum and Opinion (“Opinion”) confirming Debtor Abengoa Bioenergy Biomass of Kansas, LLC's (“ABBK”) plan of liquidation and overruling the objections to the plan filed by Drivetrain, LLC, as Liquidating Trustee for Abengoa Bioenergy U.S. Holding, LLC, et al. On February 16, 2018, Drivetrain filed a notice of appeal of the Opinion, as well as a separate notice of appeal of the not- yet-filed order confirming the debtor's plan of liquidation pursuant to Chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code. This Court consolidated the appeals on March 5, 2018. The substantive issues on appeal have not yet been fully briefed, and the case is not yet ripe for review on the merits. This matter comes before the Court on Drivetrain's Motion for Stay Pending Appeal (Doc. 24). For the reasons detailed below, the Court denies Drivetrain's motion.
On March 23, 2016, creditors of ABBK filed a Chapter 7 involuntary petition against ABBK in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Kansas. On April 8, 2016, the Bankruptcy Court granted ABBK's motion filed pursuant to 11 U.S.C. § 706(a), and ordered that the involuntary Chapter 7 case be converted to a voluntary Chapter 11 case. ABBK filed its liquidating plan (the “Plan”) and Disclosure Statement on April 14, 2017. The Plan includes four classes of claims: (1) secured claims, (2) general unsecured (third-party) claims, (3) unsecured intercompany claims, and (4) equity interests. Although classes 2 and 3 are both impaired under the Plan, creditors in Class 2 are to be paid pro rata, while creditors in Class 3 are to receive nothing. The Court approved ABBK's Amended Disclosure Statement in May 2017, set an evidentiary hearing to consider confirmation of the Plan for August 2017, set the last day to file objections to the Plan as July 7, 2017, and fixed July 7, 2017, as the last day for receipt of acceptances or rejections of the Plan. The unsecured creditors in Class 2 accepted ABBK's Plan. Those creditors in Class 3 were deemed as denying the Plan.
Shortly before ABBK's bankruptcy proceedings began, in February 2016, numerous Abengoa affiliates filed voluntary petitions for relief under Chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Missouri (the “Missouri bankruptcy proceedings”). On June 6, 2017, Drivetrain was appointed as the Missouri Liquidating Trustee under the Missouri plan. Under the trust agreement appointing Drivetrain, Drivetrain retained the power and authority to take all actions that may be taken by any officer of the Missouri debtors, including the right to prosecute any causes of action held by the Missouri debtors. The instant appeal revolves around intercompany claims held by four of the Missouri debtors. These claims are held by Abengoa Bioenergy Company, LLC (“ABC”), Abengoa Bioenergy Engineering & Construction, LLC (“ABEC”), Abengoa Bioenergy Trading, LLC (“ABT”), and Abengoa Bioenergy Outsourcing, LLC (“ABO”) (collectively, the “Missouri Debtors”).
Acting as the liquidating trustee for the Missouri bankruptcy proceedings, Drivetrain filed an objection to confirmation of ABBK's Plan on July 7, 2017, as well as a competing plan of liquidation that provided for payment of the four Missouri Debtors' claims on par with trade creditors' claims, but separately classified other intercompany claims of Abengoa entities in a lower class. Drivetrain's plan received few votes.
• ABBK is one of over 700 affiliates and subsidiaries in a global concern, Abengoa, S.A., a Spanish corporation. ABBK is part of Abengoa's U.S. bioenergy group, and is wholly owned by Abengoa Bioenergy Hybrid of Kansas (“ABHK”), a Kansas limited liability company.
• ABBK's sibling affiliates include Abengoa Bioenergy Company, LLC (“ABC”), Abengoa Bioenergy Engineering & Construction, LLC (“ABEC”), Abengoa Bioenergy Trading, LLC (“ABT”), and Abengoa Bioenergy Outsourcing, LLC (“ABO”), all of whom are part of the bioenergy group and Chapter 11 debtors in Missouri (collectively the “Missouri Debtors”). Many of the U.S. Abengoa bioenergy affiliates did business with each other, including ABBK with the Missouri Debtors.
• ABBK built a plant in Hugoton, Kansas, as a demonstration project to be used by its upstream corporate parents to demonstrate their design-build capabilities and new technology developed in the alternative fuels and power cogeneration fields. The initial construction was funded in part by a $95 million grant and a $45 million loan guaranty by the U.S. Department of Energy (“DOE”). ABBK substantially completed the plant in late 2014, but only after extensive cost overruns. ABBK experienced operational and equipment problems, and although the Hugoton plant produced 75, 000 gallons of ethanol in 2015, it never approached commercial viability. While ABBK was not intended to be a revenue producer and was not expected to cash flow until the plant construction became operational in 2015, ABBK never generated significant cash flow and the Hugoton plant was never fully operational prior to the bankruptcy filing.
• In November 2016, ABBK sold the Hugoton plant, its principal asset (a 25-million-gallon capacity, second-generation cellulosic ethanol and cogeneration plant) for approximately $48.5 million.
• ABBK and the Missouri Debtors were managed by the same board of directors and officers, had the same general counsel, and shared back office operations including accounting, legal, administrative, IT and other services. The same law firm, DLA Piper, represented ABBK, the Missouri Debtors, and the Delaware Debtors in their respective bankruptcy cases, and Armstrong Teasdale is ABBK's co-counsel in both the Kansas and Missouri bankruptcy cases.
• ABBK had written contracts with ABO, ABEC, and ABT. Undisputed testimony, however, explained that these written contracts were prepared only as a formality to satisfy the DOE's requirements for ABBK to obtain the DOE loan guaranty. While Drivetrain had not located the written agreement between ABC and ABBK at the time of trial, ABBK did not deny the existence of that agreement and the consistent treatment of the loans on ABC's and ABBK's books suggested the existence of some form of agreement or protocol.
• ABC holds the largest intercompany claim at $55, 044, 663.41. ABC did not report any loans payable by ABBK in its 2014 audited financial statement. Significant “lending” only began in 2015 when ABBK had exhausted the DOE funds and grew more reliant on other affiliates and Abengoa, SA. to fund the completion, start up, and commissioning of the Hugoton plant. Drivetrain offered testimony from Matthew Diaz, a distressed business specialist from FTI Consulting, who prepared a summary of itemized advances and repayments for 2015 between ABBK and ABC. There is only one repayment noted in Diaz's summary-ABBK provided ABC with a $460, 000 payment (without interest) in March 2015. No. further payments were made or, based on the record before the Bankruptcy Court, demanded. ABC booked credit transactions and funds deposited in ABBK's accounts as loans, akin to operating loans without interest, repayment, and maturity terms. ABBK's Executive Vice President described the flow of funds as follows: ABBK would ask ABO for money for some purpose. If ABO could not source that money domestically, it would request a draw from Central Treasury in Seville, Spain. If approved, the funds would be disbursed to ABC, who would then disburse the funds to ABBK. He described ABBK as being “totally one hundred percent dependent on . . . the affiliates and the corporate entity.” By 2015, ABBK requested funds for utilities and other essential services “to keep the lights on.” Drivetrain's 30(b)(6) representative described ABC's essential function “as the bank for the [b]ioenergy companies.” . ABEC provided engineering and construction management services to ABBK under a written agreement and holds a claim for $1, 883, 354.84. The agreement provided for services to be rendered and billed monthly with set hourly rates to be charged by ABEC depending on the nature of the services rendered. Monthly invoices would be submitted and were payable within two days of billing. The invoices referenced in Diaz's report contained summaries of amounts billed, but no hourly charge detail or description of services. And it did not appear that ABEC ever made a demand for payment, even though all amounts were payable on net two-day terms.
• ABT has a claim for $10, 905, 104.17 under its contract to procure and supply ABBK with biomass for the plant. ABBK did not make any payment on the parties' September 18, 2013, contract from August 2014 forward. ABT invoiced ABBK for each shipment of biomass during that period-some of its invoices included a contractual $1/ton fee, and others did not include this contractual fee. Had ABT not paid for the biomass it delivered, its suppliers would have been unsecured creditors of ABBK.
• ABO filed a claim for $1, 617, 790.74 for operation and financial services rendered to ABBK. Under the parties September 13, 2013, agreement, ABO was to provide ABBK a suite of services that included human resources, office furniture and rent, IT services, legal services, insurance, and aviation. The agreement would remain in effect until December 31, 2028, or the termination of the DOE loan guaranty agreement. The agreement fixed an annual fee of $535, 000-an amount to be adjusted in subsequent years-and ABBK made no payments to ABO during the year preceding the bankruptcy filing.
• The Missouri Debtors' intercompany claims are different from those of non-affiliate Class 2 creditors.
• The Missouri Debtors' claims have several things in common: (1) all arose while they shared management with ABBK and knew the status of the Hugoton plant and ABBK's financial condition, (2) three, if not four, of them are grounded on written contracts required by the DOE as a condition of its loan guaranty to ABBK-nothing suggested they were the product of any arm's length bargaining, (3) the liquidation of each is based on book entries, e-mail threads, wire transfers, and in some cases, other source documents such as invoices, (4) only the issuing of invoices and direct payments make these claims look similar to ordinary trade creditor claims, (5) despite scrupulous documentation, no documented demands for payment or collection efforts were made, and (6) none of the affiliates harbored any expectation of payment from ABBK, even when the obligations were incurred.
• No prepetition efforts were made by ABT to collect for the biomass it delivered; likewise, ABC, ABEC, and ABO took no measures to collect or enforce the debtor's obligations to them. The affiliates knew of ABBK's condition when debts were incurred, they understood ABBK's dependence upon them, and they understood that ABBK was a demonstration project-not a revenue-producing entity like other bioenergy affiliates that operated first generation plants. This understanding was facilitated by the board meetings among the shared leadership of the entities at which ABBK's condition was discussed. ABBK's Executive Vice President testified that ABBK and the other bioenergy affiliates operated in an integrated manner, which included sharing the same management.
• The proponents of the plans in the Missouri and Delaware bankruptcy proceedings, with few exceptions, separately classified intercompany claims below unsecured third-party claims and denied payment of those claims. The Delaware plan denied distribution to any intercompany claims except that ABC's claim against ABHK was reserved. The Missouri plan subordinated all intercompany claims and denied them distribution, except for distributions to ABBK on account of its claims. ABBK's Plan subordinates all intercompany claims with no exceptions.
• ABBK's Executive Vice President testified that the complexity of intercompany transfers made it more expeditious to classify them below third-party claims. He also testified that none of the affiliates ever expected to be paid, particularly after the beginning of 2015 when the Hugoton project became plagued with problems and “everybody” knew it would not be profitable. Although Timothy Daileader, Drivetrain's principal, also testified as to the reasons for different treatment of intercompany claims in the Missouri and Delaware bankruptcy cases, the Bankruptcy Court accepted ABBK's Executive Vice President's testimony regarding why it separately classified intercompany claims.
• Drivetrain argued that the Missouri Debtors' claims were based on extensions of credit to ABBK, without which ABBK would have been forced to rely on third-party credit, making these claims the equivalent of non-affiliate claims. Given ABBK's start-up status, however, unsecured third-party credit likely would not have been available to ABBK, and ABBK's assets could not be encumbered without the DOE's consent. ABBK's affiliates were its only likely sources of working capital or operating credit.
• Drivetrain's distressed business specialist, Diaz, testified that the intercompany claims were incurred for valid contractual obligations and because ABBK's books and records reflected as much, they should be treated on par with non-affiliate claims. He relied on internal records to show that ABC tracked fund outlays to ABBK, accrued interest on these outlays, and, from time to time, requested their repayment. These outlays were consistently booked as “short term loans.” Diaz did not go back to Spain to view the flow of money among the 700 entities. He did not consider the relationship among the affiliates as complex or unusual, and opined that the claims were “good claims.” . ABBK and the Kansas Committee stipulated to the terms of an order providing for a Key Employee Incentive Program (“KEIP”), which included that all intercompany claims were to be subordinated to the claims of trade creditors. While the Missouri Debtors were not party to the stipulation, their plan recognized the Kansas KEIP priority over the Missouri creditors. It provided that any funds recovered from ABBK's estate by the liquidating trustee on account of the Missouri Debtors' claims would be paid only after the KEIP claims are paid. The Missouri Debtors' plan, as corrected, was filed before ABBK's plan and provides for the subordination of all intercompany claims (except those of ABBK).
• The similarity of the plan and release provisions in the other bankruptcy proceedings involving Abengoa entities supports ABBK's contention that, at least among the debtors, there was an understanding that each other's debts would be released and not paid (except where specified). The ABBK Plan release, however, is the only release to specifically refer to intercompany or affiliate claims. ABBK's Executive Vice President testified that subordination of intercompany claims was “part of the strategy from the beginning . . . that the [shared bioenergy] management team had from the time that these cases were filed, probably from the beginning of 2016.” This consensus, reached among ABBK's Executive Vice President, the companies' CEO at the time, general counsel of the bioenergy group, and possibly one other person, was not reduced to writing, but was “reflected in the disclosure statement.” This testimony was uncontroverted.
• The evidence of a subordination agreement is not based solely upon the testimony of ABBK's witness. Sam Star, Drivetrain's Rule 30(b)(6) designee, acknowledged that, given the experimental nature of the Hugoton project, the intercompany claimants expected repayment of the intercompany obligations only if and when the plant was completed and became operational. That did not occur. The Missouri Debtors' continuation to fund ABBK when they knew the state of ABBK's affairs is circumstantial evidence consistent with the subordinated treatment of affiliates' intercompany claims.
• ABBK proved that its motivation to separately classify and treat the Missouri Debtors and other affiliate intercompany creditors' claims was sincere.
The Bankruptcy Court rejected Drivetrain's legal arguments in opposition to confirmation of the Plan. First, it held that separate classification of the affiliate intercompany claims is permissible under 11 U.S.C. § 1122(a) as “[n]othing in the bankruptcy code prohibits the separate classification of like claims into different classes so long as that is not done for the purpose of gerrymandering voting on the plan.” The Bankruptcy Court found that ABBK demonstrated both (1) the uniqueness of the affiliate claims by virtue of their shared ownership, management, and objectives, as well as (2) the subordination understanding among the affiliates.
Second, it held that the Plan did not separately classify the intercompany claims for the purpose of gerrymandering. In rejecting Drivetrain's gerrymandering argument, the Bankruptcy Court noted that the intercompany claims were separately classified because they are dissimilar from the third-party trade creditor claims, and alternatively, even if they were substantially similar, there is no evidence that the separate classification was motivated by gerrymandering. Rather, when the Plan was filed, the Missouri Debtors remained debtors in possession, were still managed by the same individuals as ABBK, and shared the same general counsel, and were represented in court by the same lawyer. When the Plan was filed, the shared management team agreed to the proposed classification and treatment of intercompany claims. Thus, there was no tactical reason for ABBK to seek to differently treat a “blocking” unsecured claim. Also, the Plan honored an agreement that third-party trade creditors and vendors would be paid ahead of intercompany claims.
Third, the Bankruptcy Court held that ABBK's Plan satisfied the best interests of creditors test under § 1129(a)(7). It held that “[e]ven without considering whether the Delaware, Missouri, and Kansas debtors agreed that intercompany debt would be subordinated, my ‘rational speculation' must certainly include the likelihood that a chapter 7 trustee would question paying the claims of four affiliated companies who shared information, management, and objectives at par with unaffiliated and less informed third-party creditors.” Further, based on its factual conclusion that ABBK shared an intention with the Delaware and Missouri debtors to subordinate the claims, the Bankruptcy Court concluded that said agreement would be honored under § 510(a).
Fourth, the Bankruptcy Court concluded that the separate classification of intercompany claims below general unsecured claims does not amount to unfair discrimination in violation of § 1129(b)(1) under any of several tests typically employed by courts in this and other circuits. Fifth, it concluded that the Plan complies with the absolute priority rule found in § 1129(b)(2)(B) because creditors in class 4 will not receive any proceeds or distributions under the Plan. Finally, the Bankruptcy Court found that the Plan was proposed in good faith and complies with all requirements of § 1129(a), (b)(1), and (b)(2).
• The factual findings have ample record support, and ABBK's witnesses were more credible and persuasive on critical issues than Drivetrain's witnesses.
• It properly applied the § 1129(a)(7) best interests of creditors test, which requires the plan proponent to show that a creditor that has not accepted the plan would receive no less under it than if the estate's assets were liquidated in a Chapter 7 case.
• Drivetrain's Due Process arguments lacked merit as it could not claim that it did not have notice of what was at stake or that it was deprived of the opportunity to appear and be heard at a two-day trial concerning the Debtor's plan, preceded by an actively managed pretrial process.
• Factual findings supporting the conclusion that the debtors corporately agreed that their claims would be paid after those of unaffiliated third parties, if at all, has support in the record and is unlikely to be found clearly erroneous.

References: § 706
 § 1122
 § 1129
 § 510
 § 1129
 § 1129
 § 1129
 § 1129