Page:MOAC Mall Holdings v. Transform Holdco.pdf/3

Syllabus

merely “plausible” or “better” than nonjurisdictional alternatives. Id., at ___. Pp. 7–8.

(2) The Court identifies nothing in §363(m)’s limits that purports to “gover[n] a court’s adjudicatory capacity.” Henderson, 562 U. S., at 435. The text does not address a court’s authority or refer to the jurisdiction of district courts. Instead, the provision takes as a given the exercise of judicial power over any “authorization under subsection (b)” and explicitly contemplates that appellate courts might “revers[e] or modif[y]” any covered authorization, even though a reversal or modification of a covered authorization may not “affect the validity of a sale or lease under such authorization” to a good-faith purchaser or lessee under certain prescribed circumstances. This is not the stuff of which clear statements are made. Rather, this Court has treated similar statutory caveats as “significan[t] evidence of nonjurisdictional status.” Reed Elsevier, 559 U. S., at 165. Given §363(m)’s clear expectation that courts will exercise jurisdiction over any covered authorization, its text can be read as merely cloaking certain good-faith purchasers or lessees with a targeted protection of their newly acquired property interest, applicable even when an appellate court properly exercises jurisdiction. See Scarborough v. Principi, 541 U. S. 401, 414. Section 363(m) reads like a “statutory limitation,” Arbaugh v. Y & H Corp., 546 U. S. 500, 516, that is tied in some instances to the need for a party to take “certain procedural steps at certain specified times,” Henderson, 562 U. S., at 435.

Statutory context further clinches the case. Section 363(m) is separated from the Code provisions that recognize federal courts’ jurisdiction over bankruptcy matters, 28 U. S. C. §§1334(a)–(b), (e). And unlike other Code provisions, see §305(c), §363(m) contains no “clear tie” to the Code’s plainly jurisdictional provisions, Boechler, 596 U. S., at ___. That §363(m) issues directions does not suffice to make it jurisdictional, as the Court routinely holds statutory commands nonjurisdictional notwithstanding emphatic directives. Pp. 9–11.

(3) Transform’s creative arguments do not excavate a clear statement from §363(m)’s unassuming text. First, appealing to supposed traditional principles of in rem jurisdiction, Transform insists that §363(m) is jurisdictional because it reflects those principles. This follows, Transform says, because §363(m) operates to ensure that (absent a stay) courts cannot disturb a transfer to a good-faith purchaser, thereby confirming that the court lacks a basis to exercise in rem jurisdiction over it. Setting aside MOAC’s credible retort to this argument, Transform’s contentions merely offer a reason to think Congress intended §363(m) to be jurisdictional. That, without more, does not show a clear jurisdictional statement. See Boechler, 596 U. S., at ___. Second, Transform maintains that former Federal Rule of Bankruptcy