As Russia faces another round of payments on its sovereign debt, Biden administration officials are weighing whether forcing Moscow into default for its invasion of Ukraine would really be the best outcome, Bloomberg News reported. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Tuesday that the matter is being “actively examined” before a crucial deadline in two weeks, and a decision will be made shortly.

Junior creditors of LATAM Airlines Group SA are challenging its proposed reorganization plan, saying it improperly benefits the carrier's existing shareholders, such as Delta Air Lines, at their expense, Reuters reported. Objections were filed on Monday in Manhattan bankruptcy court ahead of a May 17 hearing at which LATAM’s lawyers will ask U.S. Bankruptcy Judge James Garrity to approve the proposal. The airline is seeking to raise $5.4 billion through its plan to exit chapter 11, which it filed two years ago as world travel halted amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

The U.S. Department of Justice on Monday announced the indictment of two Europeans for allegedly conspiring with a recently sentenced American cryptocurrency researcher to help North Korea evade U.S. sanctions, Reuters reported. Alejandro Cao de Benos of Spain, who founded a pro-Pyongyang affinity organization, and Christopher Emms of Britain, a cryptocurrency businessman, were accused of recruiting the researcher Virgil Griffith to illegally provide cryptocurrency and blockchain technology services to North Korea. Both defendants are at large.

The U.S. rolled out new sanctions on Wednesday against more than 40 individuals and entities accused of evading the ongoing wave of penalties imposed on Russia as punishment for invading Ukraine, the Associated Press reported. The sanctions include the first set of penalties against cryptocurrency mining firms in relation to the war. The Treasury Department’s sanctions arm designated the commercial bank Transkapitalbank, which has operations in China and the Middle East. Transkapitalbank is a Russian privately owned commercial bank which the U.S.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange commission (SEC) says it has charged 16 defendants with participating in multiyear penny stock schemes that generated more than $194 million in illicit proceeds, Reuters reported. The defendants, which include 15 individuals and one company, are located in the Bahamas, the British Virgin Islands, Bulgaria, Canada, the Cayman Islands, Monaco, Spain, Turkey and the United Kingdom, the SEC said in a statement.

The U.S. Internal Revenue Service has lifted its objection to Limerick-based aircraft lessor Nordic Aviation Capital’s bankruptcy plan, the Independent reported. Nordic Aviation Capital (NAC) has been seeking to get out from under $6.3bn (€5.8bn) of debt by handing it to lenders. The IRS said in a filing on April 15 that it was withdrawing its objection to the bankruptcy plan on the condition that the lenders pay any administrative claims without the IRS having to file a request for them. The IRS had raised a last-minute objection to the plan last week on technical grounds.

Texas will halt some vehicle inspections at the U.S.-Mexico border after Governor Greg Abbott’s crackdown provoked protests that halted some crucial food and equipment shipments, Bloomberg News reported. Abbott said Wednesday that the state government of Nuevo Leon in northern Mexico agreed to conduct safety inspections before U.S.-bound trucks reach the border. The inspections will continue in other sectors of the U.S.-Mexico line. Abbott said he acted in response to what he called U.S. President Joe Biden’s failure to repel undocumented migration and drug smuggling.

Mexican truckers blockaded a key Texas border crossing for a second day to protest Governor Greg Abbott’s stepped-up vehicle inspections, raising the specter of delivery disruptions for everything from avocados to auto parts, Bloomberg News reported. The growing queue of 18-wheelers on the Mexican side of the Pharr-Reynosa International Bridge has choked crossings to a halt, according to a spokesman for U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

LATAM Airlines Group SA has accused a Chilean bank representing a group of unsecured bondholders of spreading inaccurate information about the airline's proposed restructuring ahead of a key vote on the plan, Reuters reported. Attorneys for the airline will appear before U.S.

Once conduits for hundreds of millions of dollars looted from 1MDB, a group of offshore entities are being repurposed to try to track down the Malaysian sovereign wealth fund’s stolen money, Bloomberg News reported. Three British Virgin Islands-based companies linked to 1MDB on Tuesday filed for chapter 15 bankruptcy in Florida, utilizing the section of the U.S. code that allows foreign debtors to bring proceedings in the states. Their aim is to recover a portion of the $8.5 billion allegedly stolen from 1MDB, some of which may be in the U.S., the companies said.