The case that will determine Celsa’s future has come to an end. The president of Barcelona’s number two commercial court has agreed with the traditional “punishment opinion” of one week of opinion plus another day of results. If control iron and steelemploying 10,000 people Bills in Spain and 6,000m euros per year remain in Spain’s hands rubiralta family or it passes to your creditors, now it depends only on the court decision between 1-8 September. A face-to-face or crossover decision, because there is no appeal on the penalty and your decision will be final.
This Tuesday morning, the parties synthesized the differences they demonstrated last week. Rubiralta’s defense sought to persuade the judge to dismiss the creditor funds’ complaint and that the viability of the group depended on maintaining control of the group. While the plaintiff funds—SVP Global, Deutschebank, Sculptor, and Anchorage—argued to the contrary, the viability plan advocated by Rubiraltas was strongholds in the air that doomed the group to current and future bankruptcy, and among other things, a debt relief they wouldn’t accept.
After “Seen for punishment” several scenarios are opened. On the one hand, it is possible that the judge will rule in favor of Rubiraltas and dismiss the case. bankruptcy. This will not eliminate the debt that this family of Catalan industrialists maintains with various funds. Both already expired and those that will expire in the future. And Celsa’s current management must decide to generate enough cash to cover them, either by renegotiating debt—something the funds say they don’t intend—for example, by generating new revenue through future leads or cutting expenses.
The other possible scenario is that the judge decides in favor of the funds and the funds become the property of the company. This will separate the Rubiraltas and force the funds to give a name. new board to run the day-to-day running of the company. A list of names that have not yet been tied as they testified during the trial.
But in this scenario, the future of the Catalan steel giant depends not only on the judge’s decision, but also on the Government’s decision. And while Celsa is a company classified as “,strategic“Any action implying a change of ownership and address must obtain the approval of the Executive. A Government that will already be in office when the verdict is passed.
And if the Manager authorizes the transfer, Celsa’s entire debt will not be written off and there will be creditors who will continue to demand payment. One thing the new property had to deal with, whether generating a new income – which they argued was complicated during this lawsuit – or selling part of the business – they still defended their rights. Intention not to touch the current industrial model of Celsa-.
version conflict
While Rubiraltalar thought that there was no place to demand a debt swap for the shares belonging to the industrial group, Rubiraltalar objected and applied to the judge to dismiss the case through legal means, thinking that this would look more like “alas salam”.expropriationAlso, recent reports have discredited the facts by claiming that the funds are pricing Celsa’s value downwards to keep the company at a bargain price. Well, if the debt is higher than its value, the Company’s bankruptcy law allows creditors to collect outstanding shares.
According to its figures, the funds initially invested less than 250 million in a loan of 1,200 million euros from banks that lent money to Rubiralta. And based on the payment of the said loan, which has already expired, they want to be handed over 4,000 million euros worth of shares. “They are not interested in resolving the situation and have never been.. […] They plan to take advantage of a more or less temporary moment to nationalize the partners and keep more than they own”, defended Celsa’s current ownership.
Creditor funds, for their part, sought to bury any option for Celsa’s future viability under Rubiralta’s leadership, where they did not trust its solvency. Since this will happen immediately through lending, €550 million authorized by the government. Of these, 400 million went directly to pay off outstanding loans. According to the funds’ defense attorney, because its authorization is dependent on “a discount that creditors are not willing to accept,” they are “pure smoke proposing a viable alternative that turns out to be a chimera.” “We don’t even know if SEPI It’s still there,” he added.
Accordingly, the funds insist on capitalizing on the debt, ignoring that Celsa’s business will perform well enough to generate sufficient surpluses for it in the coming years. This creditors plaintiffs They accused Rubiraltas of not presenting results for the first two quarters of 2023, as these could fuel their suspicions of lack of viability in the future. And they would confirm that the record fiscal 2022 data will be an exception, not a trend, for years to come.