EFH delays bankruptcy auction for Oncor
The fight for control of the power utility Oncor will be delayed.
Energy Future Holdings, the Dallas power giant, filed a notice with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware Tuesday requesting the court take over the auction process and extend the time frame for bidding.
The development will likely set the auction back until at least the beginning of 2015, according to a source close to the process. In hearings this summer, EFH had indicated the auction would happen this fall.
The sale of Oncor had attracted competing bids from NextEra Energy, a Florida-based power company, and Hunt Consolidated, the private Dallas firm with energy and real estate interests around the globe.
NextEra pulled its bid following EFH’s filing Tuesday. Both NextEra and Hunt declined to comment.
EFH said in its filing the decision to delay, “is based on extensive consultations with potential bidders and key creditor constituencies.”
“We believe that a transparent and court-supervised marketing process will maximize the assets’ value, and we look forward to providing the court with proposed procedures for this marketing process in the coming weeks,” EFH spokesman Allan Koenig said in a statement.
EFH filed for bankruptcy in April, seeking Chapter 11 protection from $40 billion in debts largely amassed during a 2007 leveraged buyout led by private equity firms KKR & Co. and TPG.
In the reorganization plan filed in April, Oncor was to be spun off to a creditor’s group aligned with Hunt. But NextEra, which already owns power plants and wind farms in Texas, along with the electricity retailer Gexa Energy, interjected.