Clauses & Controversies

Mitu Gulati & Mark Weidemaier
  • 4.9 (47)
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Clauses and Controversies: A Podcast about International Finance, Contract Clauses and the Controversies Surrounding These Clauses

  1. 2D AGO

    Ep 155 ft. Mitu & Mark

    What if Trump Discovers that Unpaid UK (and French) Debt From WWI? The current administration has tossed concepts such as “special relationships” with allies out the window. The administration seems willing to apply just about any leverage it has to obtain concessions from allies, including concessions that might reduce the US debt. Seen in that light, what will happen when Trump and the Musketeers discover that the UK and France have hundred-year old unpaid debts? With interest, that unpaid debt would now amount to a few trillion dollars. Enforcing these debts would be near impossible, except that the UK and France own a whole bunch of US Treasuries. Could the administration try to force a swap of those Treasuries into longer term obligations? Or try to use the US government's claims against the UK and France as a setoff, reducing payments on US debt held by those governments? Seems loony. But loony is normal these days. Producer: Leanna Doty

    35 min

  2. MAR 24

    Ep 154 ft. Mitu & Mark

    What Might a Syrian Debt Restructuring (Eventually) Look Like? There is little doubt that Syria needs to restructure its debt, among other reasons to pave the way for rebuilding after a long and brutal civil war. It strikes us as too early to envision what that process will look like, but we can identify some of the key issues. The country owes a lot to official creditors, especially Iran and Russia. Much of this was off-books and was used for the military or otherwise to support former President Bashar al-Assad's repressive regime. Not surprisingly, we are already hearing the term "odious debt" raised to suggest these debts need not be repaid; there may be a separate doctrine allowing repudiation of certain war-related debts. We talk about whether these (arguable) doctrines of international law have any relevance here and about the potential role of the U.S. in a debt restructuring. Producer: Leanna Doty

    37 min
  3. Ep 153 ft. Mitu & Mark

    MAR 17

    Ep 153 ft. Mitu & Mark

    User Fees on the US Treasury Strategic Gold Crypto Reserve Trump plans to reduce the US debt. We are missing some of the steps, but here are the ones we have identified so far: 1. Golden passports 2. Tariffs 3. Maybe not tariffs 4. Okay, tariffs 5. Something about gold 6. User fee on treasuries 7. Crypto 8. ??? We speculate about what we are missing. Maybe it’s a red Tesla? Producer: Leanna Doty

    38 min
  4. Ep 152 ft. Mitu & Mark

    MAR 3

    Ep 152 ft. Mitu & Mark

    Why Do We Care Who is Behind HRB’s Sri Lankan Lawsuit? The Hamilton Bank litigation against Sri Lanka appears to be reaching the end. Or is it? The stays that were granted during restructuring talks have implications for future sovereign debt restructurings, we think. Especially Venezuela’s restructuring, which is going to be a huge undertaking. And then, there may be more drama to come in the HRB lawsuit itself. Sri Lanka says it needs more discovery, apparently to dig into whoever might be behind the lawsuit. Why? Producer: Leanna Doty

    27 min
  5. Ep 151 ft. Sarah Carlson & Elena Duggar

    FEB 17

    Ep 151 ft. Sarah Carlson & Elena Duggar

    Greece’s (Ratings) Rise From the Ashes – Wow, but also How? We study sovereign restructurings, which means we primarily study countries going into and struggling to get out of crisis. Serial defaulters such as Argentina and Ecuador are frequent topics on our podcasts. And given how bad things were a decade ago, and its history of frequent defaults before that, we might have expected that Greece would join Argentina and Ecuador as among our more frequent podcast topics. And, indeed, Greece is back. But not because it is back in crisis. Instead, it is because it has had a remarkable rise from the ashes to almost investment grade. To discuss this rise, our two good friends from Moodys Ratings, Sarah Carlson and Elena Duggar, join us. Check out an overview of Moodys Sovereign Methodology here: https://ratings.moodys.io/sovereign-methodology Producer: Leanna Doty

    39 min
  6. Ep 150 ft. Andrew Kissner

    FEB 3

    Ep 150 ft. Andrew Kissner

    Getting "J. Screwed" Sounds Better than Getting "Argentina'd" In the world of corporate debt, everyone seems to be talking about "Liability Management Exercises," where a borrower, with a subset of creditors, exploits loose loan covenants in ways that leave other creditors screaming mad. Even better, these LME techniques have clever names: "trap doors," getting "J. Screwed," etc. And while the worlds of sovereign and corporate debt don't overlap all that much, we wonder if litigation over LMEs can tell us anything about sovereign debt restructurings. Alas, we don't know much about corporate debt. Thankfully, Andrew Kissner (Morrison Foerster) joins us to dispel our confusion. Producer: Leanna Doty

    47 min
  7. Ep 149 ft. Mitu & Mark

    JAN 20

    Ep 149 ft. Mitu & Mark

    Is Sri Lanka’s Loss Reinstatement Provision a Penalty? Two of our favorite things to talk about are innovative contract clauses and ancient illogical contract doctrines that unexpectedly bite in the ass. A few weeks ago, we walked through the Loss Reinstatement provisions for Ghana and Zambia. We asked the question of whether those provisions might run afoul of the antiquated and bizarre (to us) anti-penalty doctrines under English and New York law. English law having recently become more permissive with regards to permitting penalty type clauses – if they have a legitimate business purpose -- we speculated about whether the Zambia/Ghana clauses might pass muster. Maybe. But Sri Lanka’s version of the clauses is under New York law. And New York law on this matter is still stuck in the dark ages, best we can tell. So, does the Loss Reinstatement provision for Sri Lanka run afoul of the penalty doctrine? Producer: Leanna Doty

    44 min
  8. Ep 148 ft. Mitu & Mark

    JAN 6

    Ep 148 ft. Mitu & Mark

    Sri Lanka's New MFC Clause — Have "Contorts" Arrived in Sovereign Debt? The doctrine of tortious interference with contracts is one of several that sits at the intersection of tort and contract law. These "contorts" confuse law students — lawyers and law professors too! — but can be important in practice. If not anticipated, they can create problems for unsuspecting parties and lawyers. Has Sri Lanka’s novel Most Favored Creditor clause created problems for creditors who participated in the country's restructuring? The MFC clause is confusing in places. It simultaneously seems to contemplate Sri Lanka striking a deal with holdouts (after litigation ends) and to quite aggressively try to prevent such a deal from happening. We discuss whether this creates risks for restructuring creditors and wonder why such an aggressive clause was viewed as necessary. Producer: Leanna Doty "Shades of Spring" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

    50 min
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    out of 5
    47 Ratings

    About

    Clauses and Controversies: A Podcast about International Finance, Contract Clauses and the Controversies Surrounding These Clauses

    Information

    • Creator
      Mitu Gulati & Mark Weidemaier
    • Years Active
      2020 - 2025
    • Episodes
      155
    • Rating
      Clean
    • Copyright
      © All rights reserved
    • Show Website
      Clauses & Controversies

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