corporate chapter 11 and shareholders rights

Can someone give me an answer as to what happens in chapter 11 when a company reorganizes? Thanks

Taking Advantage Of Corporate Decline
October 30, 2006 | By Justin Kuepper,
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Bankruptcy - it's a word that few people like to hear, but it can represent great opportunities for investors willing to do a little hands-on research. Bankruptcies are a process that occurs when companies can no longer afford to make payments on their debt. Oftentimes, this comes as a result of a bad economic environment, poor internal management, over-expansion, new liabilities, new regulations and a host of other reasons. This article will take a look at exactly what happens during a bankruptcy, and how investors can profit from it! (For more insight, see An Overview Of Corporate Bankruptcy.)

The Decline
The bankruptcy process is often lengthy and complex. While understanding how it works from a theoretical standpoint may be easy, there are many complications that arise when it comes to settlement amounts and payment terms.

There are two types of bankruptcy that companies may file:

1. Chapter 7 - This type of bankruptcy occurs when a company completely goes out of business and assigns a trustee to liquidate and distribute all of its assets to the company's creditors and owners.

2. Chapter 11 - This is the most common type of corporate bankruptcy for public companies. In a Chapter 11 bankruptcy, a company continues normal day-to-day operations while ratifying a plan to reorganize its business and assets in such a way that will make it able to meet its financial obligations and eventually emerge from bankruptcy.

The process for a Chapter 11 bankruptcy is as follows:

-- The U.S. board of trustees (the bankruptcy arm of the Justice Department) first appoints a committee to act on behalf of shareholders and creditors.
--This committee then works with the company to create a plan to reorganize and emerge from bankruptcy. (This plan will be discussed in greater detail later.)
--The company releases a disclosure statement after it is reviewed by the SEC. This statement contains the proposed terms of the bankruptcy.
--Owners and creditors vote to approve or disapprove the plan. The plan also can be approved by the courts without owner or creditor consent if it is found to be fair to all parties.
--Once the plan is approved, the company must file a more detailed version of the plan with the SEC via the form 8-K. This form contains more specific details regarding the payment amounts and terms.
--The plan is then carried out by the company. Shares in the "new" company are distributed and payments are made.

The Plan
Companies that go into bankruptcy often have crushing debt that cannot be paid off entirely in cash (after all, the company is bankrupt). As a result, public companies typically disband their original shares and issue new shares in order to make equity payments for the agreed upon amounts. The distribution of new shares occurs in the following order:

--Secured Creditors - These are banks that have loaned the company money with assets as collateral.
--Unsecured Creditors - These are banks, suppliers and bondholders who have supplied the company with money through loans or products, but without collateral.
--Stockholders - These are the shareholders and owners of the company.

Notice that the shareholders are at the bottom of the list. Unfortunately, they almost always are stuck with next to nothing after a company emerges from bankruptcy. So, where's the value? Let's take a look.

The Investment
Achieving above-average returns often involves thinking outside of the box - but where could money possibly be made in a bankruptcy? The answer lies not in what takes place before, but rather what takes place after a company goes bankrupt.

A stock's price is not only a reflection of the company's fundamentals, but also a result of the market's supply and demand for shares. Sometimes fluctuations in supply and demand can create deviations away from the true fundamental value of a company. As a result, the share price may not be an accurate reflection of the company's fundamentals. These are situations in which keen investors look to invest, and these situations can occur from bankruptcies.

When a company declares bankruptcy, most people are not happy because owners lose almost everything they have and creditors gain back only a fraction of what they lent. As a result, when the company emerges from bankruptcy reorganization and issues new shares to these two groups of stakeholders, the stakeholders are usually not interested in holding them in the long term. In fact, most of them dump the shares rather quickly on the secondary market. Overall, this results in excess supply of shares that are generated not from bad fundamentals, but rather from apathetic or unhappy stakeholders. Moreover, these new shares enter the market with very little fanfare (no road show, IPO, pumping, etc), which results in no added premium to the share price. It is this scenario that creates value for those willing to pick up the cheap shares and hold them until they increase in value.

The Risks
Despite how easy this process may seem, there is still a host of risks associated with investing in companies emerging from bankruptcy. For instance, a company's new shares might not accurately reflect the value of the new company, so selling may be justified. Perhaps the problems that brought the company into bankruptcy in the first place still exist, and the scenario may be likely to repeat itself.

Another threat to bankruptcy investing is so-called vulture investors. These are investment groups that specialize in buying large stakes (debt and bonds) in companies operating under Chapter 11 before new shares are issued so they are guaranteed a large amount of post-bankruptcy shares. These groups have already discovered the value, and are often the first sellers after the stock has recovered post bankruptcy.

So, when is a good time to invest? The key is doing some good old research (or due diligence, as investors like to call it). Look for companies with solid fundamentals that only entered bankruptcy due to extreme circumstances. Failed buyouts, unfavorable lawsuits and companies with identifiable liabilities (such as a bad product line) typically make good post-bankruptcy investments. Stocks with a low market cap are also more apt to be mispriced after a bankruptcy. Furthermore, stocks with low market caps and liquidity are often ignored by vulture investors and, therefore, may represent better values than those already picked up.

Conclusion
The bankruptcy reorganization process is long and complex; however, some public companies are able to emerge from it and become profitable again. These companies may represent some of the best undervalued investment opportunities for successful investors to profit from in today's market.

Resources
"You Can Be A Stock Market Genius" (1997) by Joel Greenblatt - This is one of the best books on the topic for individual investors seeking to get involved in bankruptcy investing and other not-so-common scenarios.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Can someone give me an answer as to what happens in chapter 11 when a company reorganizes? Thanks

One of many links:
http://www.sec.gov/investor/pubs/bankrupt.htm

What about a case like WAMUQ, where in the CH11 filing, they state $32B assets and $8B debt. And at worst case have maybe a $15B Net Worth?

What should shareholders expect in such a case?

company reorganizes?

What about a company like Delphi? stock is at 3 cents a share now, when they trade that stock for new after chapter 11, do you take a big loss on the new stock or is this the time when 3 cents makes much more?
Thanks....