Bankruptcy & Restructuring

Our newly formed Bankruptcy and Restructuring practice combines our Corporate team’s experience in advising on insolvencies with the unrivalled knowledge and experience of Manos Mastromanolis, the practice lead. Working closely with our colleagues in Corporate and Banking & Finance, as well as in our Commercial Litigation department, we provide a full range of services to clients facing financial distress or insolvency, and those who see viability issues ahead.

Lambadarios is one of the few major Athens firms to have a dedicated practice supporting businesses in or approaching insolvency. With Manos Mastromanolis, a respected leader and academic in this area, at the head, our team of experts specializes in guiding businesses through the complex and often challenging landscape of financial distress. Wherever possible, our approach is to identify and execute practical solutions that preserve maximum value, protect assets and position companies for a more secure future.

Our detailed understanding of the technical side of Greek bankruptcy and restructuring laws, as well as our frontline experience of advising companies and their creditors, means that we are well-placed to advise organizations of all sizes on the challenges of insolvency.

The introduction of new standards through the 2020 Insolvency Code have made this an even more complex and important area of corporate law where the value of real expertise cannot be overstated. Our specialist team is led by a senior lawyer with decades of experience in corporate law and, more recently, of drafting legislation as a senior government advisor. This breadth of experience and knowledge of the law-making process enables our team to deliver practical and efficient solutions that help stakeholders – whether they are investors and creditors, debt-management companies, or the ailing companies themselves – to achieve maximum value.

We provide a comprehensive range of bankruptcy and restructuring services, each tailored to the unique circumstances of the business in distress:

• Bankruptcy representation and filing
• Corporate restructuring and rehabilitation (“exygiansi”)
• Debt negotiation and settlement
• Creditor rights, including special rights applicable in the financial industry
• Framing contractual relationships in anticipation and during the course of insolvency proceedings
• Cross-border insolvency
• Insolvency litigation

Representative experience:

(Past) Representative experience of partner E. Mastromanolis includes:

• Advising non-Greek bondholders as major creditors of a Greek-listed jewellery company in its negotiations aiming at its restructuring under the Greek bankruptcy code
• Filing for bankruptcy relief on behalf of the Greek subsidiary of a German tour operator
• Advising credit institutions on the enforceability of their rights under financial collateral/swap/netting agreements in the context of bankruptcies of their counterparties
• Advising major airlines on the implications of their set off arrangements with credit-card issuers
• Representing the Greek representative office of an EU construction company in a trial for the initiation of secondary bankruptcy proceeding under EU Insolvency Regulations