The winner, or winners, of a court-supervised auction of bankrupt Yellow Corp.’s terminals could be announced by Tuesday, the company said in a legal filing.
The auction, which one expert predicted would feature plenty of horse-trading, began Nov. 28 and “remains ongoing,” according to the late Friday filing.
Yellow plans to notify the court and interested parties of the results by Dec. 5, specifying “the Winning Bidders (and Back-Up Bidders, as applicable) of certain Real Property Assets for which competitive bidding has ended as of such date,” the filing said.
Estes Express Lines and Old Dominion Freight Line got the bidding started early, and Estes’ $1.525 billion bid netted the carrier stalking horse rights, including expense reimbursements and a breakup fee, should the deal fall through.
Old Dominion CEO Marty Freeman told The Wall Street Journal the carrier has pulled out of the auction and will wait to see which company or companies end up with the real estate it wants.
“We can always go to them and buy it from them, if they’re willing to sell,” he said, according the newspaper.
The outcome of the auction also likely will decide the fate of a reported effort to salvage Yellow. Auto carrier Jack Cooper Transport is seeking to resurrect the company, despite all but a skeleton crew of employees being laid off and customers diverting freight earlier this year.
Beyond requiring Yellow to pay the $7.5 million breakup fee to Estes, the Jack Cooper offer involves another hurdle: persuading the federal government to extend a $700 million COVID-19 relief loan, which is due in 2024.
The bankruptcy court separately approved the sale of Yellow’s roughly 60,000 trucks, trailers and other equipment by auctioneers Ritchie Bros. and Nations Capital last month.
