Captain Mudflap--I have not seen any articles about the sale of assets to Hyundai Merchant Marine (HMM). Furthermore, any sale would have to be approved by the bankruptcy court and Hanjin's creditors. Such approval will take considerable time to complete. What I did read is that HMM is in talks with Samsung and others to take over the shipping contracts for future shipments that have not yet been loaded onto Hanjin vessels. HMM is only dealing with several large companies, so it is unlikely that this will have any effect on shipments by smaller companies, such as model railroad importers.
According to an article in today's LA Times, there are still some issues to be worked out with respect to ships stranded at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.. First of all, Hanjin has to pay $90 million to unload the ships that are stranded. It does not have those funds. Hanjin is trying to get an emergency loan, pledging their interest in a company that unloads ships at the Long Beach Terminal as collateral. This will require approval of the bankruptcy court.
The LA Times article indicated that companies with merchandise on board Hanjin ships, or merchandise that was to be loaded on Hanjin ships will experience delays in getting to market. These delays are likely to affect holiday sales.
From what I read, the shipping companies face an ongoing issue with overcapacity and Hanjin may not be the last shipping company to file for bankruptcy protection.
Other articles I read indicate that many Hanjin vessels that are loaded cannot leave the ports at which they are docked because Hanjin has not paid the charter fees to the ports. For similar reasons, Hanjin vessels have been seized by port authorities in South Africa and Singapore. This apparently is going to take a long time to resolve.
I wonder what impact this will have on the model railroad industry. Clearly this will result in delays getting merchandise to the US. Presumably the importers have already paid for the manufacture of merchandise which cannot be shipped, which may result in a cash flow crunch that will delay the production of future models.
This why I think that down the road robotics, 3d printing, etc. will become economically feasible to enable the production of model railroad merchandise to return tot he US. As the costs of those technologies decline over the ensuing years, model railroad manufacturers will likely find it cheaper and less risky to resume production in the US. How long this will take remains to be seen.
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This is what I read. (Sorry if it's incorrect)
www.businesskorea.co.kr/english/news/industry/15721-core-assets-hanjin-shipping-hyundai-merchant-marine-buy-www.foodlogistics.com/news/12252824/hyundai-merchant-marine-to-acquire-hanjin-shippings-assets I didn't write the articles...I just reported it, from the info I read - albeit, I may have misconstrued the information, and didn't realize the full scope of the article; and/or I wasn't accurate pertaining to the subject. Again, I apologize for any mistaken facts...
They've been infamous for years, announcing a new release, and a year, or so later, they would proclaim: "It's-on-the-water!" Now there may be many container's with model train related item's - at the mercy of Long Shoreman's, & labor disputes... Worse, some much-needed commodities, for the real world... 
