Argentina’s Griesafault

NEW YORK – On July 30, Argentina’s creditors did not receive their semiannual payment on the bonds that were restructured after the country’s last default in 2001. Argentina had deposited $539 million in the Bank of New York Mellon a few days before. But the bank could not transfer the funds to the creditors: US federal judge Thomas Griesa had ordered that Argentina could not pay the creditors who had accepted its restructuring until it fully paid – including past interest – those who had rejected it.

It was the first time in history that a country was willing and able

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