Macintosh

Macintosh (2016)

A&O advised the listed retail group Macintosh (including its board and supervisory board), trading in shoes such as Brantano, Manfield and Scapino, on its corporate and financial restructuring. The retail is a challenging sector from a working capital/cash perspective. Continuing the business is complex for a trading company. At the same time, this was a listed company, where profit warning requirements play an important role in the restructuring. This combination made balancing the interests of shareholders, trade creditors and secured lender very complex. We ultimately managed to bring this group into controlled formal bankruptcy proceedings with a soft landing for the banks. No pre-pack was available because it was a listed company, but because the bankruptcy was very well prepared, a sale of a large part of the business was possible in bankruptcy (as if it were a pre-pack).

“Restructuring a listed trading company is a whole different ballgame”

Sigrid Jansen (Partner, Amsterdam Restructuring) commented: “The challenges that come with restructuring a listed trading company are huge. Management needs to be mindful that it does not prejudice its secured creditors to the detriment of other stakeholders. I think it is a great result that we have managed to have a large part of the business sold and therefore continued in bankruptcy.”

The A&O Team

The restructuring involved teams across Amsterdam, Belgium, London, Hong Kong and Luxembourg.

The Amsterdam team was led by partner Sigrid Jansen and Brechje van der Velden, assisted by associates Etienne Courbois and Dawid Lyszczarz.