Douglas Buckley

Doug’s most recent representations include the ongoing representation of the indenture trustee for two issuances totaling $350 million of tax-exempt industrial revenue bonds guaranteed by Enviva Inc. and its subsidiaries that sought bankruptcy protection in March. Immediately prior to that, he represented an ad hoc group of holders of tax-exempt industrial revenue bonds related to AES Puerto Rico LP, a private producer of electricity in Puerto Rico, in the consensual out-of-court restructuring into new senior tax-exempt bonds and preferred shares and related transactions essential to the restructuring, such as structuring rescue financing for AES Puerto Rico and negotiating an amended power purchase and operating agreement between AES Puerto Rico and its sole customer, the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority, through the integrated closing of these transactions in March 2024. Doug’s other recent engagements include representing indenture trustees and bondholders in respect of conduit financing relating to health care providers, postsecondary educational institutions and companies developing cutting-edge technology to refine sustainable biofuel products.

Apart from the Municipal and Infrastructure Special Situations team, Doug was part of the core corporate restructuring team representing the parent ad hoc claimant group in the cross-border case of LATAM Airlines, which successfully emerged from bankruptcy in November 2023 facilitated by nearly $4 billion in exit capital backstopped by the parent ad hoc claimant group, after prevailing in multiple litigations before the bankruptcy court and appellate courts (including the Second Circuit). He also represented the Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors of Eagle Hospitality Trust (Eagle Hospitality Group), whose Chapter 11 plan was confirmed with the support of the committee following months of negotiation and consummated within a year of the case filing in January 2021.

Doug began work on municipal bond restructuring matters by representing some of the largest single bondholders and ad hoc groups of bondholders in the ongoing restructuring of debt issued by the commonwealth of Puerto Rico and its instrumentalities. As a member of the core bankruptcy team since joining Kramer Levin, he represented mutual funds holding more than $3 billion in bonds issued by the Puerto Rico Sales Tax Financing Corp. (COFINA) in a restructuring under the federal Puerto Rico Oversight, Management, and Economic Stability Act (PROMESA) restructuring law, including intercreditor and interdebtor litigation that culminated in a global settlement and a confirmed Plan of Adjustment. Doug also represented an ad hoc group of bondholders comprising mutual fund and distressed investors holding as much as $3 billion in bonds issued by the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA) in the negotiation of a restructuring support agreement contemplating an exchange of $8 billion in PREPA bonds for securitization bonds issued by a newly created special purpose vehicle. 

Some of Doug’s other notable work includes representing the holders of more than $2 billion in bonds issued or guaranteed by FirstEnergy Solutions Corp. and its subsidiaries in the company’s restructuring, and representing Nuveen Asset Management as the largest holder of City of Lombard/Westin Hotel revenue bonds and appropriation municipal bonds from pre-petition negotiations through confirmation of a Chapter 11 plan in the Lombard Public Facilities Corp. restructuring.