Welcome from EACTP president, Alan Tilley |
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With the introduction of the education and training programme satisfactorily launched with considerable help from Jan Adriaanse and his Leiden team and our Education Coordinator Helen Lindop plus Director Simon Jones we now move on to marketing the programme. Our thanks to all of the team. The direction of the education programme passes to the Education Committee which is being strengthened.
We welcome offers from members who wish to join the Education Committee, please reply to this email if you'd like to join.
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Simon has now moved from Finance to Marketing Director and is actively engaged in the marketing process with our external marketing consultant.
Maria Pombo takes over from Simon as Finance Director.
We include in this newsletter the new launch brochure to attract aspiring professionals (please click here to view it).
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We have candidates already undertaking the on line learning course (click here for more), including a Romanian insolvency judge who believes that an understanding of turnaround will be invaluable to her work. So the education programme has attracted considerable interest across a wide stakeholder community. In the coming weeks and months we will spread the gospel of turnaround as being particularly opportune in this period of uncertainty surrounding over leverage and economic recovery.
We are aware that the Board has focused much time on education and less on promoting the benefits of certification to CTP’s. We are moving to remedy that. In particular we have been reaching out to stakeholders in the UK to promote the benefits of engaging with a CTP. As President of EACTP I wrote to the Chairman of the UK Government’s All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) who are investigating the effectiveness of UK insolvency and the conflicts that exists between Insolvency Practitioners (IP’s) and secured creditors. Our thrust is that there was an imbalance between debtor and creditor rights that favours insolvency over turnaround and which destroys value to the detriment of unsecured creditors and employees. We particularly target the conflict arising in the new CIGA moratorium legislation that requires the supervisor to be an IP. Now that CTP is an exam based profession our case is that CTP’s should also be permitted to act as a moratorium supervisor. I have been invited as a member of a select committee to consider the draft report and subsequently to the presentation of the report in the House of Commons in September. Such recognition of EACTP is encouraging although we wait to see the report to see if we have made the necessary impact.
We are also targeting the SME debtor community to educate management of what a CTP can achieve. We have engaged with the Confederation of British Industry, the largest group representing management and an illustrative article has appeared in this month’s online journal of a real life case study to demonstrate turnaround ahead of insolvency. You'll find the article later in this newsletter. We are also targeting other industry member groups to press the message that CTP’s rather than IP’s are the “go-to professionals” to save shareholder value.
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It is pleasing to see the achievements of one of our new CTP’s, Oana Petrescu, admitted in March of this year for her work on the rescue and turnaround of BlueAir, a Romanian low cost airline. BlueAir was struggling even before the severe Covid downturn but she was navigating it towards safety when Covid hit hard. Now with operating improvements and state backing she has repositioned the business model and is acquiring low cost 737 MAX and landing slots in major airports such as Heathrow. BlueAir is backing into a cash rich SPV on the London AIM market. An operational turnaround which has attracted financial backing because of its viable business model.
Congratulations also to previous TMA Romania President and CTP Catalin Nichifor who has taken the interim position of turnaround CFO of Tarom, the state owned airline. No doubt he and Oana will have stories to share.
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In this edition we look at other developments in UK with changes to Pre-pack regulations which open opportunities for CTP’s. Also an article from TMA Europe President David Bryan exploring the big question; is it going to be Tsunami or a march of the Zombies!
And updates from Netherlands and Germany on new legislation and what is really happening in this markets for CTP’s.
Finally a word from TMA Global CEO Scott Stuart on the core value proposition of CTP for TMA Global.
As I sign off on this newsletter I anxiously look ahead to the time that we can resume local meetings and European conferences.
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Whilst our Zoom and Teams skills have improved there is nothing like personal contact to both increase learning and to forge working relationships and secure mandates. I wish you all a happy holiday season and hopefully a get together before the year is out.
Alan Tilley
President, EACTP
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A message from the CEO of TMA Global
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Scott Y. Stuart, Esq, Chief Executive Officer, TMA
The Turnaround Management Association is the premier global organization of turnaround and restructuring professionals worldwide. Our strength lies in the connections members create with one another—connections that can smooth tensions in a distressed situation, and the trust members rely upon to conduct business with one another.
The value proposition of TMA, no matter where in the world you are located, is to be a part of the preeminent network of turnaround and restructuring professionals who are committed to raising the standard of practice in our industry. EACTP’s launch of its online Body of Knowledge materials and examination process, supported by Leiden University, reinforces the global value of the TMA brand as the standard-bearer in the turnaround and restructuring industry.
As a global organization, our strength is in learning from one another and adapting what is working in one jurisdiction to use in another. EACTP is built on the same model as our North American Certified Turnaround Analyst (CTA) and Certified Turnaround Professional (CTP) credentials, which began with an interview-based admissions system. Their recent partnership with Leiden University has bolstered the credential’s presence in the European restructuring space. Adding the expertise of Professor Dr. Jan Adriaanse and his team builds upon our Body of Knowledge framework and ensures these volumes reflect the standard of practice in the European Union and the European Economic Area.
This partnership has already drawn the attention of regulatory bodies across the EU, who are looking to the expertise of EACTP professionals as global economies demand restructuring frameworks to preserve value and rehabilitate troubled enterprises, not just liquidate them in an insolvency proceeding.
The European Restructuring Directive ratified in June 2019 and the UK Corporate Insolvency Governance Act 2020 (CIGA) are perfect examples of how our industry is evolving worldwide, and TMA professionals are leading the way. The expertise of EACTP professionals is on display in Romania where two of our members are leading the turnarounds of two of the countries’ leading airlines, Blue Air and Tarom. Also in UK where UK CTP’s are engaging with a parliamentary committee on UK Insolvency practice to promote CTP’s and consensual turnaround and restructuring in supervision of CIGA moratoriums.
As EACTP raises the bar for professionalism and expertise, more chapters are looking to their model to establish their own certification programs. TMA Turkey, one of our newest chapters, is already learning from EACTP, TMA Southern Africa and TMA Australia, building their network of university connections toward a credential to distinguish the skills and expertise of their expert members.
Organizations like TMA exist to establish best practice and raise the professionalism of our industry. Our global certification programs in North America, Europe, Southern Africa, Australia, Japan, and nascent programs elsewhere are raising the profile of our organization, our profession, and our members like you. We thank EACTP for its advocacy on behalf of this profession, its commitment to raising the standard of turnaround practice in Europe, and its hard work to create a mutually beneficial university partnership that is now reflecting back to inspire our North American certification program.
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Join a community of highly regarded, highly knowledgeable turnaround professionals. Open to aspiring and experienced turnaround professionals, the EACTP’s Certified Turnaround Analyst (CTA) and Certified Turnaround Professional (CTP) accreditations provide an industry-standard ‘kitemark’ of quality in the practice of turnaround and restructuring.
Take the first step by undertaking the Certified Turnaround Analyst Online Learning Programme:
✓ 100% online
✓ Flexible, self-paced learning
✓ Complete in 1-2 years
✓ Schedule online exams at your convenience
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By Tom Reinen, Interim Manager, Kruger
After years of preparation and multiple consultation rounds, the Act on the Confirmation of an Extrajudicial Restructuring Scheme (the Dutch Scheme (‘WHOA’)) has entered into force on 1 January 2021, as an expansion of the Dutch Insolvency Law. The Dutch WHOA is based on the U.S. Chapter 11 and English Scheme of Arrangement.
The WHOA provides guidelines for a cross-class cram down for all creditors of the company including its shareholders and its preventive restructuring methods are in conformity with the European guidelines EU 2019/1023.
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Saving shareholder value by avoiding insolvency |
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Alan Tilley, President of EACTP
A viable SME company is rescued under the distress of severe cash pressure by engaging with a turnaround practitioner rather than an insolvency practitioner as an advisor.
An IT big data and cloud services company with a history of steady, profitable growth and three main business lines, each generating one-third of £10m revenue, was hit by two unforeseen customer problems that threatened the business' survival.
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A Tsunami of Insolvencies or the March of the Zombies? |
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By David Bryan, President, TMA Europe
Making sense of the outlook for business distress and potential insolvencies is particularly difficult as we start to emerge from more than sixteen months of business turmoil. Conflicting data abounds.
On the one hand, the amount of debt taken on under government backed loan schemes is huge. UK government statistics show the Bounce Back Loan Scheme for small businesses has lent over £47bn to 1.56m businesses. Further significant amounts have been lent other schemes with the total over £80bn. How will this be repaid? Several surveys show that many businesses think they will struggle to survive the next six months. Many think the low rates of insolvency filings during the pandemic are just insolvencies postponed. The insolvency profession has been hiring and gearing up for a tsunami of insolvencies.
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Turnaround – do we still have the right focus? |
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By Dr Volker Beissenhirtz, Beissenhirtz Business Law
“It’s not just about doing the right things, but doing things the right way.” Peter Drucker
German insolvency law has been a permanent construction site since the end of the 1970s. This truism will not change even after the SanInsFoG came into force at the beginning of 2021, as the EU Commission’s efforts to harmonise national insolvency regimes show. And it is precisely these EU efforts that, in case of doubt, are more likely to have forced Germany to change its perspective than the previous purely national reforms. After all, the introduction of a “pre-insolvency restructuring procedure” (based on EU requirements) in the form of the StaRUG and the limitation of the insolvency periods and thus filing obligations, which in the meantime have become quite excessive, chosen by the SanInsFoG to fit into German law should actually direct the focus more on the (out-of-court) restructuring of companies than on insolvency resolution. Nevertheless, I have the impression that the professional discussions are more focused on further increasing the efficiency of insolvency law (“are we doing things right?”) than on increasing effectiveness towards more (sustainable) restructurings.
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By Maria Pombo, Finance Director, EACTP
When the email from my barrister arrived in my inbox titled Pre-packed Lunch, the first thing I thought “well let’s see what’s the gossip now in the tainted world of pre-packs!”… to my pleasant surprise the gossip was the enactment of a new statutory instrument (The Administration (Restrictions on Disposal etc. to Connected Persons) Regulations 2021) that in short allows connected parties (directors, shadow directors, non-employee associates and their connected companies) to obtain a written qualifying report by an evaluator to submit it to the administrator for his consideration in order to buy back the company within a period of 8 weeks of entering an Administration process. I would let you read the rest of the article which is shown below.
I was delighted with the news for two reasons:
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Events
TMA Europe Annual 2021
Thursday 30th September 2021, Online
Registration launching soon with discounted pricing for EACTP members.
Please click here for more information and sponsorship opportunities.
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News for Members
Welcome to our new members
A warm welcome to Mirco Iwan, John Lloyd, Oana Petrescu and Aurel Podariu who have recently become Certified Turnaround Professionals (CTP).
Would you like to be the guest editor for the Autumn issue?
If you would like to be guest editor for the Summer issue of the EACTP newsletter, please email Helen Lindop at eactp@turnaround.org.
LinkedIn
Please remember to add your EACTP membership to your LinkedIn profile, and follow the EACTP LinkedIn Page. You are also welcome to join our LinkedIn group.
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Copyright © 2021 European Association of Certified Turnaround Professionals, All rights reserved. You are receiving this because you are a member of EACTP, TMA Europe or have asked to be added to our mailing list. |
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