Financial distress, bank debt restructurings, and layoffs

We develop a model of a financially distressed firm to analyze the implications of a bank debt restructuring when the operational characteristics of the firm's project for the post-distress period are endogenously determined as part of the workout. We establish a formal link between the debt restructuring and operational actions such as employee layoffs, and show how these actions are affected by the firm's capital structure, the ordering of absolute priorities, and the allocation of control rights and residual claims after reorganization. Finally, we discuss the implications of our analysis for the design of reorganization law.