Ortuz is the lawyer’s company of Mr. Hans Verhulst, advocate at the bar of Antwerp in Belgium.
Ortuz is specialized in seeking solutions for unpaid commercial and sovereign debts worldwide. Ortuz has been involved in cross border collection within and outside the EU. On the international debt market one cannot always resort to the equitable powers of the civil courts to oversee creditor-led sovereign debt workouts. Ortuz will assist you in a variety of solutions: litigation, reconciliation procedures, debt equity swaps, debt for counter-trade, debt for debt swaps etc.
Ortuz tries to offer the holders of such claims a better solution. For more than twenty years Ortuz has been gathering expertise on evaluating and seeking out solutions for international claims.
Mr. Hans Verhulst started his career as advocate in 1995 after having worked as an assistant and consequently Deputy judicial officer from 1990 to 1994. Earlier he had successfully obtained his law degree at the VUB university in Brussels (Master of Law) in 1989 and a Post graduate In Economic law in 1994. He has been awarded with the APR price for best academic paper during the academic year 1993-94. As of 1995 he started working as a lawyer in Brussels and passed his bar exam at the Brussel Bar Association that same year. After a few years of general practice Mr. Hans Verhulst started focussing on international debt collection cases in 1998. In 2005 Mr. Hans Verhulst created and registered the name Ortuz to conduct its activities as advocate or attorney-at-law.
Sovereign and private sector debt defaults are of all times. Every country has its own legal rules to respond to indebtedness. Next to the classic court actions and preliminary measures, there are also a multiple of debt restructuring procedures to avoid liquidation of productive concerns. The East Asian, Russian or Argentine crises have clearly shown that massive, system wide corporate debt distress situations could find an effective policy response through the use of out-of-court, private workout solutions among lenders and debtors. For sovereigns, reconciliation processes have been put into place and could solve a large part of a State’s foreign debt. But not all debts can be resolved in an elegant way and far too many times a creditor needs to resort to basic litigation and freezing actions.
Cases frequently involve a multiple of jurisdictions. In addition, a complex case typically involves a numerous of professional practice specialties going from international insolvency law to securities, banking and corporate law; from finance and business law to forensic accounting and auditing; from corporate finance and financial analysis to mergers and acquisitions, and different methods of litigation and enforcing money judgments.
By using national and international legal procedures it is possible to collect claims in a time and cost efficient way. The European Payment Order system allows creditors to obtain an enforceable entitlement within a reasonable short time and at a low cost. Only in case the debtor challenges the Order within 30 days after the receipt, the creditor will need to go to Court.
Ortuz has the means to check local situations and allow the creditor or claim holder to ascertain the over-all indebtedness of his debtor. Local debt collectors or legal functionaries, with whom Ortuz is working, have access to specific information about the solvency of the debtor. Knowing the financial situation of the debtor is important in order to know whether or not to proceed with an enforcement action.
A Sovereign debt is a debt instrument guaranteed by a government. When a national economy starts to default, due to different reasons (low oil prices, armed conflicts, embargos etc.) debts are not being paid anymore and solutions must be sought. As such a Sovereign debt market exists. Claim holders will start looking for payment, but the process is lengthy and expensive. Ortuz is able to guide you amongst the different options a Claimholder has at its disposal.
The Sovereign debt market evolved from a trading business to a more legal business. At first creating a value from commercial documents was fairly easy and traders could see the potential. Hence, the Debt Collection Agencies and Hedge Funds interested in buying such claims. Nowadays, public structures of the sovereign debtors are more complex (SWF, PPP, investment companies, joint ventures etc. next to the normal State structure). Traders lack the vision to deal with these kinds of files. Good knowledge about creating an international valid entitlement through arbitration or litigation and consequent execution of such, is pertinent.
Read the general terms and conditions of Ortuz here.
Quellinstraat 49
2018 Antwerp
Belgium
0032 3 225 31 78
Canadadreef 49
2270 Herenthout
Belgium
0032 14 23 53 63