TV Azteca formally entered a voluntary concurso mercantil that was admitted by a federal judge on March 20, a court order shows, even as the company’s bid to freeze enforcement actions and a standby letter of credit was rejected.
The filing was first announced by the broadcaster on February 26 and submitted on March 10 to jueza primera de distrito de concursos mercantiles Nataly Pérez Hernández. In its petition TV Azteca said it had incurred a general default on its obligations and invoked the assumptions in fractions I and II of Article 10 of the Ley de Concursos Mercantiles.
The judge’s admission on March 20 triggered formal notices to federal agencies and creditors: the Instituto Federal de Especialistas de Concursos Mercantiles, the IMSS, the SAT, the Infonavit and the Comisión Reguladora de Telecomunicaciones were notified, and the court’s auto admisorio includes a protective clause barring the suspension or cancellation of operating rights. The order states: "Se prohíbe suspender, revocar, rescindir, cancelar, modificar, limitar o afectar, total o parcialmente, cualquier concesión, permiso, licencia, autorización, registro, inscripción, título habilitante o cualquier otro derecho otorgado a favor de la comerciante que le permita operar."
At the same time, TV Azteca’s lawyers asked the court for eleven precautionary measures intended, the company said, to "se preservar la integridad de la masa concursal y evitar la afectación irreversible de los activos esenciales para su operación cotidiana." The judge denied two of the central requests: she refused to stop existing embargo proceedings and she rejected a bid to suspend any act aimed at enforcing a Standby Letter of Credit with a foreign bank.
The decision leaves an uneven set of protections in place. The admission order explicitly says the measure "no constituye ningún impedimento para que la autoridad reguladora competente en la materia de telecomunicaciones, ejerza sus facultades de regulación, supervisión, vigilancia o sanción a la comerciante con motivo del uso que ejerce del espectro radioeléctrico," preserving regulator powers while guarding the company’s concessions against outright cancellation.
The denial matters because TV Azteca is defending litigation tied to roughly $400 million in senior bonds. The Bank of New York Mellon, together with Cyrus Capital Partners and Contrarian Capital Management, maintains claims tied to those bonds; TV Azteca stopped making payments on them in February 2021. For creditors who already moved to seize or execute against assets, the judge’s refusal to halt embargoes and the Standby Letter of Credit enforcement keeps their tools available despite the concurso admission.
Complicating the picture, TV Azteca reported to the court that the Superior Court of the State of Delaware issued a ruling on April 1 removing a prior suspension of execution and seizure proceedings against the company’s assets and rights. The Delaware actions relate to obligations that had matured before the Mexican judge admitted the concurso mercantil; a motion for revocation of that Delaware decision has been filed.
Under Mexican concurso rules, the next immediate step is a visitador review of TV Azteca’s financial situation; only after that review can the declaration be resolved and the formal one‑year negotiation period with creditors begin. That timetable gives the broadcaster a structured window to reorganize, but it does not on its face close cross‑border avenues creditors have already opened.
The unresolved and most consequential question now is specific: which assets remain exposed to seizure while the Mexican court conducts the visitador review and the one‑year negotiation unfolds? The admisory order preserves operating concessions but left enforcement of embargos and a Standby Letter of Credit intact; whether bondholders will capture revenue, collateral or other rights before Mexico’s concurso process produces a negotiated plan will determine how far TV Azteca can preserve day‑to‑day operations during restructuring.
TV Azteca is a Grupo Salinas subsidiary controlled by Ricardo Salinas Pliego; the company told the court its concurso mercantil route is intended to guarantee long‑term operations and sustain multiplatform content production. The immediate legal calendar centers on the visitador’s report and any follow‑on motions in Delaware and Mexico that could reshape what assets are available to creditors in the coming weeks.
