Monday, January 19, 2009

Ecuador: Lazard et L'Hazard


And so Ecuador chooses Lazard (LAZ) (one of the few finance/asset management firms to have escaped with less than 50% share price losses last year) to advise its corner in the upcoming default swap showdown. Monsieur Le Presidente Sterdmouffeen announced LAZ on his regular Saturday show, Radio MUFN. He also came out with a couple of interesting quotes, put through the Ottotrans™ for your delectation:

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"(The contracts defaulted by Ecuador discard any arbitration and) this puts us at a great disadvantage, but we are ready for the fight."

"The legal fight will come soon and we will have to defend ourselves."

"We believe that we have legal arguments; there are so many illegalities and "illegitimicies" in the debt, but one thing is to be convinced that something is illegal and another is to be able to demonstrate it in the New York courts, where we must go to court due to these contracts."
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In other words, Correa knows exactly what kind of caca is about to hit his ventilador, he knows that the calm of debt holders so far is only the type that comes before the storm and he knows what kind of risk he has put his country under.

Brave or irresponsible? YOU BE THE JUDGE!