9th Circuit Won’t Let Bankrupt Company Assign Withdrawal Liability Deal

( September 17, 2025, 2:13 PM EDT) -- SAN FRANCISCO — Issuing a per curiam opinion in a dispute over a contract that greatly reduced withdrawal liability to a multiemployer pension fund, the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed the challenged ruling on a different ground than the lower court had, holding “that the contract is a financial accommodation, without reaching whether it is executory”; the appellant, which signed the contract before filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, unsuccessfully sought a ruling that would let it assign the agreement to its acquirer....