Ecuador

Sovereign default risks are on course to rise further in 2021, with Iraq, Sri Lanka, Angola and Gabon at high probability of default, say Goldman Sachs analysts, Reuters reported. Five sovereign debt defaults or distressed debt exchanges - in which investors swap their debt for new bonds, often with longer maturities and a reduced value - have already happened in 2020 in the aftermath of the COVID-19 crisis, the most in around two decades.

Countries do not usually gain friends when telling creditors they can’t pay them back. Yet Ecuador earned serious plaudits as it went about restructuring $17.4bn of bonds this year, GlobalCapital reported. The Ad Hoc Bondholder Group that owned more than half of the sovereign’s bonds even said that the process “set a precedent” for Covid-19 era restructurings. Jan Dehn, head of research at Ashmore, part of the Ad Hoc group, explains that on one hand the group was referring to modifications in collective actions clauses that some creditors hope will become standard practice.

Rafael Correa, the leftist leader who governed Ecuador for a decade and defaulted on its debt, and his protégé in next year’s presidential election said they would reject the spending cuts requested by the International Monetary Fund as part of a loan deal, Bloomberg News reported. “These austerity policies kill economies,” Correa said in an interview from exile in Belgium. “We’ll check all of this.

The International Monetary Fund agreed to lend Ecuador $6.5 billion which will allow the nation to complete a bond restructuring plan and fund its 2020 budget, Bloomberg News reported. The deal announced Friday will enable the exchange of $17.4 billion of debt to go ahead before the Sept. 1 deadline. The country had agreed with bondholders that it would seek a new IMF deal, and that the restructuring wouldn’t go ahead without one.

As serial defaulters Argentina and Ecuador near the finishing line on their latest sovereign debt overhauls, foreign creditors are nervy about investing again without macroeconomic reforms and International Monetary Fund support, Reuters reported. On the surface, the prospects for both countries look brighter. Absent complicated negotiations with the IMF, a clean slate post-debt restructuring will allow them to focus on reviving their COVID-19-ravaged economies with much less concern about looming foreign debts to repay.

Ecuador is aiming to secure additional financing by the end of August to help plug its fiscal gap after wrapping up a deal to restructure $17.4 billion of debt, according to Finance Minister Richard Martinez, Bloomberg News reported. President Lenin Moreno’s administration is negotiating a new program with the International Monetary Fund as well as some $2 billion in bilateral loans from China. Martinez said the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank is also considering a $50 million loan to support small and medium enterprises. “August is key,” Martinez said in an interview from Quito.

Ecuador will extend the deadline for creditors to vote on its $17.4 billion debt restructuring plan to Monday following a lawsuit by a small group of bondholders, the finance ministry said on Thursday, Reuters reported. The South American nation originally said the vote would end on Friday, but pushed the deadline back at the request of the U.S. Court for the Southern District of New York following a suit by investment funds Contrarian Capital Management and GMO.

Ecuador pushed forward with its debt overhaul plans on Monday, requesting a vote among its creditors on reconfiguring the terms of $17.4 billion of its external bonds, with its largest group of creditors backing the proposal, Reuters reported. Under the proposed deal - unchanged from the government’s earlier proposal - 10 existing bonds maturing between 2022 and 2030 would be swapped for three bonds due in 2030, 2035 and 2040, as well as a past due interest bond maturing in 2030.

Ecuador is coming under pressure to sweeten its $17.4bn debt restructuring after some bondholders balked at the terms of the deal it presented earlier this month, the Financial Times reported. The country — one of the poorest in Latin America — said in March that it would be unable to repay all its debts as it deals with the fallout of Covid-19 and a collapse in oil prices. Earlier this month, the government announced a provisional agreement to cut and stretch out repayments, with the backing of the holders of around half of its bonds, including heavyweights Ashmore and BlackRock.