The “trial of the century” in sovereign debt restructuring, in our humble opinion. The story of Argentina, its holdout creditors, the grande finale (or is it?) of their battle in US courts.
Spotted on Tuesday… the pari passu saga that started in the US courts crosses another border. Belgium:
UPDATE (Friday) – Judge Griesa said he won’t comment on Citibank’s request, at least until the Second Circuit’s final ruling on objections to the form of his order:
Citibank asserts that it needs clarification as to its obligations in the event that the Court of Appeals affirms the District Court’s November 21,2012 rulings. The District Court declines to make any further comment on matters now before the Court of Appeals. What further ruling or action is required from the District Court will obviously depend on the holding from the Court of Appeals. No more can be said at this time.
Now back to Thursday’s original post for the stakes involved…
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Hat-tip to Bloomberg — it looks like we have a new entrant in the pari passu saga.
Citibank.
Technically it’s Citibank’s Argentine branch. They’ve made a slightly curious request for ‘clarification’ of Judge Griesa’s order last November for Argentina to pay bond holdouts alongside other, restructured creditors. (Payments just to the latter could be seized, and ultimately launch Argentina into a sovereign default… just to catch you up.) Read more
Well, this was fun while it lasted. Now what did it mean?
Click to enlarge the document capping a weird week in the pari passu saga:
It’s an order from the Second Circuit on Thursday, denying an unusual request filed on Monday by the Italian retail investors who count themselves among Argentina’s holdouts.
Although looking back at it, was the unusual or just ahead of the curve? Read more
With its latest submission in this Court, the Republic of Argentina continues its long and consistent pattern of defaulting on its contractual obligations, defying the laws of the United States (which its contracts expressly invoked), and showing contempt for the courts to whose jurisdiction it unreservedly submitted. The government of Argentina plainly believes the rule of law does not apply to it…
Guess that’s a no, then. Read more
A short video to catch up on Joseph’s pari passu saga. We hope you enjoy. Read more
Update (4 April) – The Second Circuit has ordered NML to respond to the Argentine proposal by April 22. Which is as expected but more time on the clock for the Republic.
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In theory, there was no offer. “This is a proposal to judges, not an offer to vultures,” Argentina’s finance minister tweeted at the weekend.
For their part, the three judges of the US Second Circuit had ordered Argentina to tell them “how and when it proposes to make current those debt obligations on the original bonds that have gone unpaid over the last 11 years” (emphasis ours). It’s a last act in the battle that Argentina has been losing to stop restructured debt payments being linked to its defaulted bonds under the pari passu clause.
In practice, the 22-page letter that the government sent to the Second Circuit on Friday — containing “options” for holdouts to take payments “equitably and ratably” with bondholders who swallowed its 2010 debt restructuring, by getting restructured bonds in place of the original debt — pretty much was an offer.
And — it looks like — not one the judges can accept. Meanwhile, the market has panicked like wildebeest. Read more
Guess it pretty much comes down to the alternative ‘formula’ for paying its holdouts which Argentina will be making to the Second Circuit at the end of this week, then.
The court on Thursday denied the government’s separate request to have its pari passu case reheard ‘en banc‘ — that being when a full court hears your case, instead of a panel of judges (which is usual): Read more
They’ve become interesting side-players in the saga principally starring Argentina — so it’s probably worth noting the latest from these two Caribbean sovereigns…
Belize has closed its restructuring with 86 per cent approval by its creditors: Read more
Some excerpts from a lawsuit filed by the Export-Import Bank of China (Taipei) against Grenada in a United States district court on March 4, 2013…
If you have been following the pari passu saga on ratable payment of sovereign debt — they tell their own story. (Click to enlarge all images.) Read more
In case you didn’t fancy ploughing through our 3,000+ words on NML v Argentina last week at the Second Circuit…
Barclays’ analysts have boiled down the next turning point in the pari passu saga into two paragraphs, in their March 5 note (irresistibly titled ‘Cram-down or sanctity of contract? Is there a way out?’): Read more
Headline via the Harlan Ellison short story. “Timewise, it was jangle…”
What a week for the pari passu saga, and the fight to show that an order for Argentina to pay holdouts ‘ratably’ alongside its restructured sovereign debt is both over-reaching, and an unfair threat to third-party bondholders and banks.
Yep, FT Alphaville also went along to the oral argument before three judges of the Second Circuit in NML v Argentina on Wednesday, along with about 300 other people. A pretty crazy affair in itself, the hearing has now led to a follow-up order from the court, telling Argentina to give “precise terms” explaining how it would pay holdouts, and how it would obey any decision of the Second Circuit. Read more
We haven’t written up our full take on Wednesday’s (nuts) oral argument in NML v Argentina (sorry), though you should read this, just out from the Second Circuit on Friday…
The court has ordered Argentina to specify “precise terms” of how it would wish to pay holdouts, differently to the current injunction to pay them ‘ratably’ in full: Read more
Update (Feb 26) – It turns out that we failed to be clear on something pretty important here… rendering our headline ironically pretty apt. Maybe you really can’t believe Belize’s disavowal of ratable payment on its bonds.
OK, so here’s the section on pari passu language in the new bonds’ Offering Memorandum: Read more
A familiar saga pops up in the prospectus for Paraguay’s recent US dollar, New York law bond…
A great resource from Shearman & Sterling, in their note marking the end of the briefing war in the Argentine vs holdouts pari passu saga.
It’s a schematic of the arguments which the Second Circuit will likely consider when deciding appeals against an order for Argentina to pay holdouts alongside restructured bondholders. Some of the arguments are key. Some are not so key. Read more
As if we could keep away from the latest paper mountain in the pari passu saga.
Argentina and its restructured bondholders (and Bank of New York Mellon) filed briefs to the Second Circuit on Friday, returning fire at the most recent salvo from holdouts. Read more
At times, pursuing a defaulted sovereign debtor for full payment can almost (almost) come across as a facetious exercise. As when NML’s latest brief in the Argentine pari passu case quotes Casablanca. Read more
Holdouts’ opposition papers in the Argentine pari passu saga had just landed at pixel time on Friday. Here’s the one from NML itself, and here’s the one from other holdouts including Aurelius Capital.
We’ll try to do a proper take later on what the briefs say, but first, we thought we’d devote this post to some context on where the litigation is going as well. Read more
If you thought the Argentine pari passu bond saga had taken the holiday dead period off — then you don’t know the pari passu saga very well.
Some interesting developments squeezed in before the new year… Read more
A riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma, inside a pari passu clause.
Here are some terms from Italy’s 2015 US dollar bond, which it issued under New York law in 2010. It is a pari passu clause, even though you won’t find the words ‘pari passu’. Read more
Yep, this is a Greece post in a series on Argentina and the pari passu saga.
We’ll explain. Read more
On October 26, the Second Circuit chucked out Argentina’s appeal against having to pay bond holdouts, having had “little difficulty concluding” that the defaulted debt’s dusty, old — but contractually standard — pari passu clause demanded rateable payment. Read more
And so ends a little saga-within-a-saga in the Argentine bond holdout case (but one which shed interesting light on the various sides’ litigating strategies). Read more
UPDATE – Beyond the to-and-fro about stays and the Second Circuit in the post below…
Bank of New York Mellon has filed for leave to appeal Judge Griesa’s revised order for Argentina to pay (and for third parties not to assist it in not paying – including BNY). This is a significant move given the role of BNY enabling payments to restructured holders as their trustee. It was kind of stuck in the middle over the dispute between Argentina, holdouts and restructured bondholders, and had last asked courts to clarify its obligations. This filing marshals indenture trust law, Rule 65(d) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, and “dangerous precedent” to seek to challenge the merits of Judge Griesa’s ruling itself. Read more
Looks like those emergency bondholder briefs had some effect on the Second Circuit…
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that the motion by the Exchange Bondholder Group for leave to intervene as interested non-parties for the purpose of appealing orders entered by the district court on 11/21/12 and for the purpose of seeking a stay pending appeal is GRANTED. Read more
Stay, actually. An emergency motion for a stay on Judge Griesa’s sweeping order in the Argentine bond holdouts case — filed on Monday night by the Exchange Bondholder Group:
It’s fair to say that many of those following Argentina’s grand bond holdout battle have been simply flattened by this week’s turn of events.
(Sometimes, literally so.) Read more
Let’s say you took part in Argentina’s original, 2005 debt restructuring.
You exchanged your luckless bonds for securities worth around 30 cents of your original dollar. You took your lumps – and you checked, very carefully, the complicated payment structure designed to ensure the Republic can’t stiff you in the future. Read more
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2We cannae give the economy no more, we're giv'n it all we've got Captain
3The case for official e-money +1
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5"Companies should know who really owns them..."
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