"Argentina might be forced to negotiate bond fight" Associated Press June 18, 2014
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina — Argentina’s president has objected to the conditions of a US judge’s ruling requiring a $1.33 billion debt repayment, but analysts say she may ultimately have to negotiate with the holdout investors she calls ‘‘vultures’’ to avoid an impending default and a new blow to the country’s reputation.
She must mean Wall Street.
President Cristina Fernandez at first indicated she wouldn’t go along with the terms of a judge’s ruling that the defaulted bonds be repaid after the US Supreme Court on Monday left the earlier order in place.
In a national address Monday night, Fernandez defiantly vowed not to submit to ‘‘extortion,’’ from NML Capital and others that have refused two opportunities to swap defaulted bonds for new, less valuable bonds that the government has reliably paid since 2005. But she also said she had been working on ways to keep Argentina’s commitments to other creditors.
Her hard line came hours after the justices in Washington refused to hear Argentina’s appeal, and it could be a last effort to gain leverage ahead of a negotiated solution that both sides say they want. But with only days before a huge debt payment ordered by the court is due, many economic analysts and politicians say the country’s already fragile economy could be deeply harmed if she doesn’t immediately resolve the dispute.
‘‘Another default can be quite costly economically and financially,’’ said Goldman Sachs’ Latin America economist Alberto Ramos.
--more--"
Looks like AmeriKan ju$tice to me.
"Argentina’s last debt card is a doomsday scenario" by Michael Warren | Associated Press June 20, 2014
BUENOS AIRES — Argentina’s government is finally preparing to negotiate a payment plan for the $1.5 billion in bad debts and interest it owes to the US hedge funds it demonizes as ‘‘vultures.’’
But before both sides sit down for talks, President Cristina Fernandez wants everyone to know she still has some cards to play.
Despite the US Supreme Court’s decision to turn away Argentina’s last appeal, Fernandez has promoted the idea that her government can ignore its rulings and meanwhile keep its promises to a much larger group of bondholders. Her ministers say she can avoid defaulting on another $24 billion in debt by paying them outside the US financial system.
I would do it.
What is AmeriKa going to do, invade?
Most analysts say this scenario will never work.
Consider my $elf-$erving $ource for a moment.
Meanwhile, Fernandez’s Cabinet chief, Jorge Capitanich, on Thursday denied that an Argentine team would go to New York for talks with creditors next week, backtracking on a promise the government’s attorney made to a judge the day before.
‘‘There’s no mission or committee prepared for a trip to the United States,’’ Capitanich said. He did not provide any details about next steps, but said, ‘‘We’re going to utilize all the strategies that could be convenient to defend the national interest.’’
I expect Argentina to soon be demonized in my propaganda pre$$ pages.
New York billionaire Paul Singer, whose hedge fund NML Capital Ltd. won the case, will have to decide whether Fernandez is bluffing. The stakes couldn’t be higher for Argentina’s fragile economy.
The poker mind$et of the propaganda pushers bothers me when it's a world of chess.
It's all about winning the next pot even if you lose big, rather than formulating a strategy that will pay off in the long run.
That will be the underlying narrative of the Third Word War and the collapse and destruction of the AmeriKan empire.
Here are some ways it could play out:
In ‘‘Plan A,” Argentina complies with the orders of US District Judge Thomas P. Griesa.
It pays the plaintiffs 100 percent in cash, plus interest, on debt that went into default a dozen years ago, starting with $907 million by June 30.
I'm sorry; the hedge fund guy is going to have to take a total lo$$ here because we are clearing the books. Just think of it as lost IRS e-mails or something.
That’s when another $907 million is due on the $24 billion in ‘‘exchange bonds’’ owned by the 92 percent of investors who agreed to swap defaulted debt for new bonds worth a third of their original face value. The holdout plaintiffs own about 1 percent of the original defaulted debt, and sued rather than agree to provide Argentina debt relief. The judge says exchange bondholders can’t be paid unless the holdouts get an equal amount.
You expected $omething el$e out of greedy money addicts?
The pros of this approach? With nearly $29 billion in foreign reserves left and very low indebtedness relative to the size of its economy, Argentina can afford to make this month’s payments, at least. And if it is willing to follow New York law and borrow again, it can meet future bond quotas without abandoning its populist programs.
Time to get out of the debt en$lavement game!
In fact, bond analyst Josh Rosner says Wall Street firms are eager to lend Argentina whatever it needs to pay off all its remaining defaulted debt, which Fernandez said totals $15 billion.
That should tell you $omething.
The main con for Fernandez? Most Argentines blame international debt for causing the very crisis that led to the default, and are fearful of taking on major new loans.
Yeah, DOING the $AME THING OVER and OVER and EXPECTING a DIFFERENT RE$ULT, well, that's just IN$ANE!
The official story of Fernandez’s ‘‘victorious decade’’ is that she and her late husband, President Nestor Kirchner, restored Argentina’s economic sovereignty after foreign banks brought the nation to its knees. They paid down international debts, even at a huge cost.
But without affordable access to foreign credit, the government has already spent much of the Central Bank’s reserves on energy subsidies and social programs, weakening its ability to control inflation and manage the money supply. Fernandez is correct when she says ‘‘it would not only be absurd but impossible’’ to use half the remaining reserves to pay court judgments in cash, as the judge has ordered.
In ‘‘Plan B,’’ Argentina defies the judge, forcing US banks to stop processing its payments to the 92 percent of bondholders who have been getting paid. Argentina then offers to swap these freshly defaulted New York bonds with new bonds paid from Buenos Aires and guaranteed by Argentine law.
Cabinet chief Jorge Capitanich said Thursday that this remains Argentina’s plan, and blamed the judge for making it impossible to meet its June 30 responsibilities in New York.
Fernandez controls Argentina’s Congress, so she could get this plan approved locally, but organizing a debt swap can’t be done in little over a week, meaning missed payments are inevitable. And because Argentina has the capacity, but not the will, to pay the court judgment, this would be more than a ‘‘technical default,’’ as Argentine authorities have described it.
The missed payments would most likely trigger a cascade of bad outcomes and threaten to unravel many other debt accords, including Argentina’s recent deal to repay $9.7 billion to the Paris Club of lending nations, which includes the United States.
The main pro of this approach is that defying the so-called ‘‘vulture funds’’ is a highly popular idea among Argentines.
That means the Argentines, like the rest of the world, have had it with the Wall Street crowd.
Argentina’s law firm advised Fernandez that her best option for leverage was to default first and negotiate later. So even if it doesn’t work, it could give a president intent on showing the global financial system who’s boss in Argentina a short-term boost as she begins the last 500 days of her eight years in office.
They won't like that!
And if Singer believes she’s not bluffing, he might just offer a face-saving deal she can carry back from the edge of the abyss. The main con? Few people who understand bond markets think it has any chance of success
About 85 percent of the creditors would have to approve it, said Matias Carugati, an economist for Buenos Aires-based consultancy, Management & Fit, and many investment funds are barred from making such a change. Others would be wary of relying on Argentine law.
--more--"
Looks like Iran will not score any goals today, as predicted by the Globe anyway.
I know there are some African teams playing today, so....
"Ebola getting ‘out of control’; Outbreak hitting Africa is worst yet" by Sarah DiLorenzo | Associated Press June 21, 2014
DAKAR, Senegal — The Ebola outbreak ravaging West Africa is ‘‘totally out of control,’’ said a senior official for Doctors Without Borders, who says the medical group is stretched to the limit in its capacity to respond.
The current outbreak has caused more deaths than any other on record, another official with the medical charity said. Ebola has been linked to more than 330 deaths in Guinea, Sierra Leone, and Liberia, according to the latest numbers from the World Health Organization.
International organizations and the governments involved need to send in more health experts and increase public education messages about how to stop the spread of the disease, Bart Janssens, the director of operations for the group in Brussels, told the Associated Press on Friday.
‘‘The reality is clear that the epidemic is now in a second wave,’’ Janssens said. ‘‘And, for me, it is totally out of control.’’
The outbreak, which began in Guinea either late last year or early this year, had appeared to slow before picking up pace again in recent weeks, including spreading to the Liberian capital for the first time.
‘‘This is the highest outbreak on record and has the highest number of deaths, so this is unprecedented so far,’’ said Armand Sprecher, a public health specialist with Doctors Without Borders.
According to a World Health Organization list, the highest previous death toll was in the first recorded Ebola outbreak in Congo in 1976, when 280 deaths were reported. Because Ebola often touches remote areas and the first cases sometimes go unrecognized, it is likely that there are deaths that go uncounted, both in this outbreak and previous ones.
The multiple locations of the current outbreak and its movement across borders make it one of the ‘‘most challenging Ebola outbreaks ever,’’ Fadela Chaib, a spokeswoman for the World Health Organization, said earlier in the week.
The outbreak shows no sign of abating, and governments and international organizations were ‘‘far from winning this battle,’’ Unni Krishnan, head of disaster preparedness and response for Plan International, said Friday.
But Janssens’ description of the Ebola outbreak was even more alarming, and he warned that the governments affected had not recognized the gravity of the situation. He criticized the World Health Organization for not doing enough to prod leaders and said that it needs to bring in more experts to do the vital work of tracing all of the people who have been in contact with the sick.
‘‘There needs to be a real political commitment that this is a very big emergency,’’ he said. ‘‘Otherwise, it will continue to spread, and for sure it will spread to more countries.’’
--more--"
Has the globalist endgame of planetary genocide begun?
A look at yesterday's results:
Swiss to limit immigrants from EU
The step comes in response to a national referendum in February that required the government to take steps to ‘‘stop mass immigration.’’ ‘‘We can’t just use immigration to bring cheap workers into the country,’’ Swiss Justice Minister Simonetta Sommaruga told reporters in Bern on Friday.
Especially when they are infected with Ebola.
Related:
Swiss Pi$$ Off Bankers
France trounces Switzerland
French Flurry
Americans take note: In World Cup, a ‘flop’ is often a hit
It's one of the things turning me off to both.
