PREPA Won’t Release Plan Before Bondholder Discussions

The Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority plans to withhold public release of its business and financial plan, due Monday, so it can been discussed with creditors, a PREPA spokeswoman said.

"PREPA is aware that the June 1st deadline is of high interest to the people of Puerto Rico," president of PREPA's governing board Harry Rodriguez said in an official statement. "We want to inform you that PREPA is continuing discussions with all of its stakeholders leading up to this deadline when we will present the proposed recovery plan to our creditors. However, in light of ongoing work and discussions, PREPA will not comment on the recovery plan until it has had a chance to discuss and negotiate the proposed plan with the creditors."

PREPA Chief Restructuring Officer Lisa Donahue is expected to hand the report over on Monday, June 1. The report is expected to be a comprehensive plan for PREPA, including a possible restructuring of the authority's debt.

As of Jan. 31, PREPA had about $9.2 billion in total debt, of which about $8.4 billion was bond debt. A default on the bond debt would be the biggest in U.S. municipal bond history.

In other PREPA news, Caribbean Business reported that a joint venture of York Capital Management, NRG Energy Inc. and ITC Holdings Corp. offered to invest $3 billion toward rejuvenating PREPA power generation and transmission systems.

The PREPA spokeswoman said she was unaware of the report. The offer was reportedly made to Gov. Alejandro García Padilla. On Thursday afternoon, a spokeswoman for the governor said her office was preparing a statement about the topic.

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