NEW YORK – General Tobacco, maker of brands such as Bronco, Silver and GT One cigarettes, is planning to shut down after failing to make Master Settlement Agreement payments owed to states, reports the Wall Street Journal.

GT, which became the sixth-largest U.S. tobacco company during the last decade,

“stopped producing cigarettes and other tobacco products at its North Carolina plant several months ago, according to J. Ronald Denman, executive vice president and general counsel,” writes the newspaper.

Denman said that GT struggled to keep its prices competitive while meeting the demands of the MSA.

In 2008, General Tobacco sued many attorneys general and tobacco companies, alleging that the MSA violated federal antitrust and constitutional law. A U.S. judge in Kentucky dismissed the case last year. GT filed an appeal this year and does not "want to throw in the towel" on the legal challenge, Denman told the newspaper, adding that there is chance GT could get back into the cigarette business.

"But as we sit here today having lost just about everything," GT plans to shut down, he told the newspaper.