Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico employment was up 1.2% in February compared to January.

The Puerto Rico Oversight Board has named a veteran of the Ukraine’s 2014-to-2016 restructuring to be its executive director.

Puerto Rico’s general obligation bondholders called for negotiations on the island’s debt after a judge halted litigation between them and holders of the island’s sales tax revenue bonds.

Puerto Rico bond recoveries may be better than projected by the Oversight Board in the fiscal plan it approved this month, according to a Moody’s analyst.

Subcommittee members heard testimony about the chances for and potential fallout from attempts to renegotiate the PREPA restructuring support agreement as well as what stakeholders have been doing to help the financially troubled commonwealth.

Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority bondholders are resisting the island government's effort to overhaul the utility's existing deal to restructure its business and more than $8 billion of bond debt.

The House subcommittee hearing on the soon-to-expire PREPA restructuring support agreement aims to gather information about the status of ongoing negotiations between Puerto Rico and PREPA creditors.

Puerto Rico Resident Commissioner Jenniffer González Colón said that an extension of the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management and Economic Stability Act litigation stay was unlikely.

The Puerto Rico Oversight Board’s plan to have enough money to pay 26% of debt due in the next nine years is a “first salvo” whose debt payment terms can be negotiated, experts say.

The SEC wants a Puerto Rico federal court to agree that Jose Ramirez, a former UBS Puerto Rico employee, engaged in a scheme to defraud investors in closed-end funds with large investments in Puerto Rico bonds.

The House Natural Resources Committee, which played a key role in creating PROMESA, will hold a hearing in one of its subcommittees on March 22 to discuss PREPA’s restructuring support agreement.

The Puerto Rico Oversight Board approved a 10-year fiscal plan that will allow the payment of 23.7% of debt due.

The Puerto Rico Oversight Board rejected Ricardo Rosselló’s 10-year fiscal plan on Thursday and gave him until 9 a.m. Saturday to present a revision.

The House Financial Services Committee and Senate Banking Committee both approved companion bills that would end a legal loophole that lawmakers allege allowed broker-dealers to defraud Puerto Rico investors have received committee approval and are now pending before the House and Senate.

The Puerto Rico legislators, journalists and others are raising concerns of a lack of transparency at the federal Oversight Board appointed in August to address the island’s debt crisis.

The Puerto Rico Oversight Board plans to approve a 10 year fiscal plan for Puerto Rico at a public meeting on Monday.

Saying that Puerto Rico's liquidity is critically low, the Puerto Rico Oversight Board recommended Wednesday that the island's government immediately adopt emergency spending cuts.

The president of Puerto Rico’s main opposition party said financial disclosures reported in The Bond Buyer may disqualify some members of the federal Oversight Board and staff.

Puerto Rico Oversight Board Interim Executive Director Ramón Ruiz owns at least $265,000 in Puerto Rico bonds and debt, in what some observers said may be a violation of federal laws on conflict of interest.

Investors are mindful of the lessons of Puerto Rico’s financial distress as they chase higher yields and the benefits of interest payments that aren’t taxable by the federal government or by any U.S. state or municipality.