Venezuela needs to protect PDVSA's oil assets then default - advisers Walker and Cooper

Venezuela should put its state oil company PDVSA into Chapter 15 US bankruptcy protection and then default on an estimated US$63bn of bond obligations, according to the lead adviser to Greece during the country's debt restructuring in 2012. In a newly published paper, Mark Walker, who worked at Lazard when he advised Greece and is now managing director at Millstein & Co, argues that Venezuela should prioritise using oil export revenues to remedy social chaos rather than keeping its debt repayments whole. The paper was written with Richard Cooper, a partner at law firm Cleary Gottlieb. But, the paper argues, a default on Venezuela's and PDVSA's obligations (with a combined face value of US$63bn) only makes sense if the country's prime assets, principally its oil reserves, are protected from creditors. More…