Enron managers should know by the end of June whether or not the company’s Chapter 11 restructuring plan has been approved by the US bankruptcy court hearing its case. If the plan is approved, Enron could be out of bankruptcy shortly afterwards.
The difficulty for Enron has been to find the necessary resources with which to pay its creditors. Its assets have fallen from an estimated total of $65 billion in 2000 to a current estimate of $11 billion. However, it also faces outstanding claims of $134 billion, and it is not clear how the company intends to pay them off. Enron’s current assets consist of three working businesses – Portland General Electric, CrossCountry Energy, and Prism Energy – valued together at $3.7 billion. It also has $7.4 billion from successful legal actions and asset sales.
Enron has agreements in place to sell Portland General to Oregon Electric for $2.3 billion, and CrossCountry to NuCoastal for $2.2 billion. It plans to distribute the proceeds of these sales to creditors, and also to sell its subsidiary Prism.
