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Lessons from Argentina’s Default on its International Sovereign Debt

Argentina has defaulted on its international sovereign debt nine times, including three times during the past two decades. In 2001, the government defaulted on more than US$132 billion of federal sovereign debt. By the end of 2019, Argentina owed about US$323 billion of federal sovereign debt to, among others, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Paris Club and private bondholders. In May 2020, Argentina defaulted (and restructured) again on the payment of its international sovereign bonds. Although the restructuring of sovereign debt with the IMF and the Paris Club is dealt with in one-to-one negotiations, the restructuring of sovereign bonds involves a more complex process. Argentina has gone through two sovereign debt restructuring processes, first between 2005 and 2016 and then in 2020. Argentina has learned some lessons from these processes, mainly from the 2005–2016 restructuring, which contributed to a more efficient process in 2020. We discuss each of these processes, their differences and the lessons learned from each, as well as how Argentina handled the other two sovereign debt restructuring fronts: the local exchange of domestic bonds denominated in US dollars and governed by Argentine law, and the debt restructuring with international financial institutions (mainly the IMF and the Paris Club). […]