Ms Sarah Paterson

This course is available on the MSc in Law and Accounting, Master of Laws and Master of Laws (extended part-time study). This course is available with permission as an outside option to students on other programmes where regulations permit.

This course will be relevant to the following LLM specialisms: Corporate and/or Commercial Law. This course is capped at 30 students. Students must apply through Graduate Course Choice on LSE for You.

This course focuses primarily on registered companies and is concerned with the rescue of financially distressed companies and businesses. The formal legal procedures available for rescuing companies and businesses in financial distress are analysed as are informal approaches to corporate failure. Topics include: Introduction: Aims and Objectives. The administration of insolvency processes: insolvency practitioners, the Insolvency Service and turnaround professionals. Corporate Rescue Procedures: informal rescues. Corporate Rescue Procedures: formal procedures. Business rescues - comparative approaches: USA, Chapter 11.

20 hours of seminars in the MT. 2 hours of seminars in the ST.

A variable format: some lecture-discussions, some student-paper-led discussions, some debates and guest speakers where appropriate. Week 6 will take the form of a reading week.

One 2,000 word essay.

A full Reading List will be distributed during the course. The recommended text is V. Finch, Corporate Insolvency Law: Perspectives and Principles (Cambridge University Press, 2009) (2nd edition). Wider background reading will include some comparative law reform and other material including: The Report of the Review Committee on Insolvency Law and Practice (Cork Report) (Cmnd 8558, 1982); T H Jackson, The Logic and Limits of Bankruptcy Law, Harvard (1986).

Exam (100%, duration: 2 hours) in the main exam period.