Large corporate bankruptcy filings are down to their lowest point since 2007. Just 18 companies with more than $100 million in assets filed for bankruptcy protection during the first quarter of this year, and only two had more than $1 billion in assets. That’s fewer than a quarter of the number of first-quarter 2009 filings.
Two of the firms that held a lock on big bankruptcies through the recession—Weil, Gotshal & Manges and Sidley Austin—did not get any new large Chapter 11 matters this past quarter. That continues a drought: Weil was tapped by just one company with more than $1 billion in assets in 2010; Sidley had none, according to bankruptcydata.com. Kirkland & Ellis, meanwhile, continued its lock on the debtor side; Kirkland and Akin Gump were the only firms with two large matters in first-quarter 2011.
