Evergreen Solar Inc. failed to win an injunction barring Barclays Plc from selling shares of the solar power company it received when it bought assets from bankrupt Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge James Peck in Manhattan today denied the request, saying he wasn't convinced there was a chance of immediate, irreparable harm to Evergreen by Barclays selling the stock.
“This is a complaint that can probably be characterized as a long shot,'' Peck said of Evergreen's suit.
Evergreen sued last month seeking the return of 12.2 million shares it said Lehman improperly transferred to Barclays in the $1.54 billion sale of Lehman's North American brokerage business. Marlboro, Massachusetts-based Evergreen loaned the shares to Lehman as part of a $325 million convertible-note transaction in July and said Lehman never owned the stock.
Barclays having control over 7 percent of Evergreen's shares hurts the company's ability to raise money to continue building its solar manufacturing plant in Massachusetts, Michael El-Hillow, Evergreen's chief financial officer, testified today at a hearing in New York.
Boaz Morag, a Barclays' attorney, said there wasn't evidence that the bank's owning the shares is harmful to Evergreen. If Barclays was forced to hold the shares, it “bears all the market risk,'' he said, which is unfair to the London- based bank.
When it sought bankruptcy protection Sept. 15, Lehman listed more than $613 billion in debt as of May 31, dwarfing WorldCom Inc.'s 2002 bankruptcy, previously the largest.
