Venezuelan creditors are obviously more focused on oil production in the long run as the ultimate driver of recovery value, given a restructuring is a long way off, but oil sales being put into escrow might be of *some* interest them in the meantime (not sure if positively or negatively)

There may be $30bn of legal claims out there ($19bn materialised for the Citgo creditor auction). Add the very large bond claim ($60bn plus ~$40bn of past due interest), and a $150bn estimate for Venezuela’s overall external debt starts to look on the low side.

Gold Reserve “applauds the recent actions in Venezuela by President Trump, his administration and the Joint Armed Forces of the United States to bring Nicholas Maduro to justice....“ www.businesswire.com/news/home/20...

One thing about Venezuela's default having lasted so long is that, while prices have rallied to about 40 cents or so per dollar of face value, past due interest may be about 70% of principal by now. This is part of why funds liked the trade (and may stay in despite incentives to take profits).

This may not matter very much to those who bought PDVSA bonds at two cents in the dollar back in the day, though. Who can stay in or exit to investors who only just started paying attention to Venezuelan bonds, but will want some (partly because they are in an EM bond index).

Lots of questions on whether oil companies will get paid out before bondholders - but this was already happening, with Chevron able to recover debts owed by PDVSA through its license to operate. Arbitration claims are also relatively insulated from a restructuring (no CACs).

If Delcy Rodriguez was in Russia, she’s not now, after addressing Venezuelan security heads. www.telesurenglish.net/venezuelas-v...

Two things now:
- Do the security forces go along with a Rodriguez interregnum
- Is it an interregnum. Bondholders have thought before that elections might follow a Maduro exit by 6-8 months. Will that happen