UPDATE: Smurfit-Stone Container Corp Files For Chapter 11

Cardboard box manufacturer Smurfit-Stone Container Corp. (SSCC) filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy Monday, strapped for cash due to sliding sales.

An operator of 162 manufacturing plants mostly in the U.S. and Canada, Smurfit-Stone owns timberland, paper mills and recycling centers.

For the quarter ended Sept. 30, the Chicago company listed assets worth $7.45 billion and debts near $5.6 billion.

(This article also appears in Daily Bankruptcy Review, a publication from Dow Jones & Co.)

Debts include $1.2 billion in secured bank loans from a syndicate led by JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM), $2.275 billion in unsecured bonds, $388 million in debts linked to an accounts receivable financing arrangement, and $284 million worth of tax-exempt utility systems bonds, according to documents filed in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Del.

Smurfit-Stone had warned it might resort to bankruptcy to weather a liquidity crisis linked to the economic downturn. With about $316 million worth of net debt payments coming due this year, the company was struggling to find the free cash to meet its obligations. Smurfit-Stone boxes are used to deliver consumer goods, so slumping sales elsewhere have hit its revenue.

-By Peg Brickley, Dow Jones Newswires; 215-462-0953; [e-mail]

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