Argentina takes anti-vulture funds ad campaign to European media

The ad published in both American and European media ratifies Argentina''s call for ''fair negotiations.''

Three days after publishing in the Wall Street Journal an ad questioning the position of vulture funds in their 1.3 billion dollar dispute with the country, the government stepped up its pressure against bondholders that rejected the 2005 and 2010 debt swaps. Now, the full-page advert campaign has reached Britain’s Times and Financial Times, Spain’s El País and Germany’s Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.

The piece, which is the same that was published first on Saturday in the US Wall Street Journal, is entitled “Argentina wants to continue paying its debts but they won’t let it.”

“7 percent of bondholders did not accept the restructuring. The vulture funds that secured a ruling in their favour are not original lenders to Argentina. They purchased bonds in default at obscenely low prices for the sole purpose of engaging in litigation against Argentina and making an enormous profit. Paul Singer’s NML fund, for example, in 2008 paid only 48.7 million dollars for bonds in default. Judge Griesa’s ruling now orders that it be paid an amount of 832 million dollars, i.e. a gain of 1608 percent in only six years,” the advert reads.

While the Cristina Fernández de Kirchner administration intensifies its strategy against vulture funds taking the billionaire bond fight to the international spotlight, Economy Minister Axel Kicillof yesterday announced the government had formally requested Griesa to issue a stay for the South American country, which would serve as a temporary shield against paying both holdouts and restructured bondholders by the end of July.