Billy Corgan Loses Lawsuit Against TNA Wrestling

In mid-October, we reported that Smashing Pumpkins mainman and IMPACT Ventures president Billy Corgan had filed a lawsuit against TNA Wrestling, which is owned by IMPACT. With the court records sealed, there was no access to the case, but now The Tennesean has reported that Corgan has lost the lawsuit as he attempted to gain control over the company.

After personally funding three TNA events, Corgan refused to open his wallet for for the Bound for Glory pay-per-view, which is viewed as TNA's version of the WWE's Wrestlemania. The last event he funded contained a clause stating that if TNA became insolvent, Corgan would acquire the 92.5 percent voting share held by chairwoman Dixie Carter and would now have control over TNA.

Judge Hobbs Lyle said, “The (relevant section) of the pledge agreement, the court concludes, was not implemented in accordance with Tennessee law and the LLC operating agreement, and Section 6 is, therefore, unenforceable to remove the defendant LLC managers. As to the occurrence of a default by way of insolvency, there has not been demonstrated a substantial likelihood of success on the merits because the operative text of the pledge agreement, ‘becomes insolvent,’ is ambiguous when applied to the facts of record.”

Corgan has since posted a series of tweets (seen below) regarding the proceedings and outcome, grateful that a judge heard the case, also singling out that these business practices are ones he's worked hard to fight against.

While he did not win the court case, Corgan will at least see his loans repaid with interest, which is set to begin today (Nov. 1). He also has the option to convert this debt into 36 percent equity in the company.

Attorney Scott Sims stated, “Mr. Corgan understands that temporary injunctive relief is an extraordinary remedy and, due to the nature of the proceedings, he did not have full access to information in the defendants’ possession that bears on the issues in this case. Mr. Corgan looks forward to the opportunity to conduct full discovery into these matters and present his case in its entirety to the Court at a later date.”

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