Countries had to rely on a Market-based approach to resolve excessive Debt Problems
Because a formal bankruptcy regime for governments does not exist (though Anne Krueger, the International Monetary Fund’s then-deputy managing director, proposed one more than a decade ago), countries have had to rely on a market-based approach to resolve excessive debt problems. Following this approach, the country offers to exchange old bonds for new bonds with a lower face value and/or lower interest payments and longer maturities. If most investors accept this offer, the restructuring occurs successfully.
But this implies a key problem: Whereas a bankruptcy court can force holdout creditors to accept the exchange offer as long as a significant majority of creditors have already done so (a so-called “cram down”), the market-based approach allows some creditors to continue to hold out and sue to be paid in full.
- in www.project-syndicate.org
Nouriel Roubini is an American professor of Economics at New York University`s Stern School of Business and chairman of RGE Roubini Global Economics