Centre of Main Interests of the Debtor in Delineating the Courts’ Competence in Bankruptcy Cases

The paper studies the centre of the debtor's main interests, the attention is paid to theoretical approaches to its understanding, peculiarities of legal regulation in the countries of the European Union and the states that have incorporated the UNCITRAL Model Law on Cross-Border Insolvency. The relevance of the chosen topic is due to the need to improve the legal regulation and doctrinal understanding of cross-border bankruptcy in Russian law. Among the specific reasons are the following: the absence of a full-fledged legislative regulation of cross-border bankruptcy in Russia, the enactment of acts by the courts aimed at filling the gaps in the absence of specific regulation, in particular, of bankruptcies of foreign persons, the existence of discussions in the academic community regarding the debtor's centre of main interests as a criterion for determining jurisdiction in the context of its consolidation in Russian law. The relevance of the selected problems is confirmed by the recent Judgment of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation of 8 February 2024 № 305-ЭС23-15177 on the “Westwalk case”, which for the first time systematically outlined the peculiarities of regulation of bankruptcy of foreign companies in Russia and considered in detail the concept of the “centre of the debtor's main interests”. Among the objectives of the work the following can be emphasised: (1) formation of a theoretical approach to the description of the debtor's centre of main interests, (2) clarification of the current state of legal regulation of cross-border bankruptcy in the Russian Federation, (3) identification of trends in the regulation and application of the debtor's centre of main interests in the law of foreign states and unions, (4) suggestion of ways to optimally enshrine the debtor's centre of main interests in Russian law. This paper consists of an introduction, the main part including three chapters divided into paragraphs, conclusion and bibliography.