Venezuela

One of China’s biggest state-owned oil companies is suing its Venezuelan counterpart in a US court, in a sign that Beijing’s patience over unpaid debts is running out as the Caribbean nation falls deeper into economic and social chaos, the Financial Times reported. A US subsidiary of Sinopec is suing PDVSA, the Venezuelan state oil company, for $23.7m plus punitive damages over a May 2012 contract to supply steel rebar for $43.5m, half of which it says remains unpaid, according to court documents seen by the Financial Times.

Back in May, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. stirred up a public-relations nightmare when its asset-management arm bought almost $3 billion worth of distressed Venezuelan bonds for pennies on the dollar. They were labeled “hunger bonds,” a nod at the country’s deepening humanitarian crisis, and critics pilloried Goldman Sachs online. Now, to make matters worse for the bank, those bonds are in default, Bloomberg News reported.

It has been called the Schrödinger’s cat of the debt world — the country that simultaneously both is and is not in default. This month, Venezuela announced it would restructure all its foreign debts, the Financial Times reported. Soon after, it began missing deadlines for bond payments and was declared to be in default by rating agencies and others. Nevertheless — apparently — it continues to make payments on its bonds.

Crystallex International Corp. and Venezuela agreed to settle a $1.2 billion dispute over the 2011 nationalization of a gold deposit in the South American nation, Bloomberg News reported. Ontario Superior Court Justice Glenn Hainey in Toronto approved the settlement on Friday after it was announced two days earlier through filings in Canada. Parts of the agreement remain sealed, including the amount to be paid.

Already in default and struggling with sinking oil production, Venezuela’s state-run energy firm told its employees to cut costs and expenses by 50 percent in an austerity drive to reflect the broader economic crisis hitting the OPEC nation of 30 million people, Bloomberg News reported.

As Venezuela struggles to make bond payments on time, about a dozen institutions holding the country’s debt are in the early stages of organizing themselves and meeting with attorneys, according to people with knowledge of the matter. The group -- which isn’t yet an official committee -- includes mutual-fund managers Pacific Investment Management Co., T. Rowe Price Group Inc., Amundi Pioneer, Ashmore Group Plc, AllianceBernstein Holding LP, Fidelity Investments, BlackRock Inc. and Allianz SE, as well as the asset-management arms of Goldman Sachs Group Inc.

Venezuela’s efforts to restructure its debt may have triggered an initial stampede for the exits, but some investment funds are maintaining their portfolios or even beefing them up, betting that other investors’ distress could spell opportunity, Reuters reported. President Nicolas Maduro spooked bondholders this month when he announced plans to restructure some $60 billion in bonds as his socialist government struggles with an economic crisis brought on by years of mismanagement. Yet Maduro also said the country would keep servicing its obligations for now.

Petróleos de Venezuela is the oily lifeblood of the country which owns it, so default should spell the beginning of the end for creditors, the Financial Times reported in a commentary. PDVSA’s exports are the only reason the government has been able to meet foreign debt repayments. After four years of recession and shortages of everything its citizens need, Venezuela has finally run out of road. Well, almost. Last week, the government was deemed in default by credit rating companies, following a delay in bond payments.

Despite reassurances from the Venezuelan government and state-run oil company that checks for past-due bond payments are in the mail, few investors have actually seen the money yet, Bloomberg News reported. No matter. Bonds are rising, paring some of the selloff sparked by President Nicolas Maduro’s announcement Nov. 2 that he would seek to renegotiate the nation’s billions of dollars in overseas debt obligations. Investors have little choice but to take his word for it and assume the procedural delays in the payment chain, which have worsened since U.S.

Russia signed an agreement to restructure $3.15 billion of debt owed by Venezuela, throwing a lifeline to a crisis-wracked ally that’s struggling to repay creditors, Bloomberg News reported. The pact gives Venezuela some much-needed breathing room as it faces the much more complicated task of restructuring its $140 billion of bonds and foreign loans. For Russia, the deal underscores the costs that come with President Vladimir Putin’s geopolitical ambitions across the globe. A $900 million hole had been left in its 2017 budget plan by Venezuela’s failure to pay on time.