Russia Headed for Default?
Reuters is reporting tonight the following:
TOKYO, Feb 10 (Reuters) – The euro fell over 1 percent against the yen and the dollar, weighed down by a report that Russia was to request negotiations with European and other foreign banks to postpone repayment of private sector debt.[...]
[...]Russia will request negotiations with European and other foreign banks to postpone repayment on up to $400 billion of its private sector debt, the Nikkei said.
From Bloomberg:
Nikkei newspaper report(s) that Russian banks and businesses may seek to reschedule $400 billion of foreign loans deepened concern financial turmoil in Europe is worsening.[...]
[...]“The Nikkei report of rescheduling debt is driving the euro lower because European financial institutions have a bigger exposure to Russia than their counterparts in other countries,†said Takashi Kudo, Tokyo-based director of foreign-exchange sales at NTT SmartTrade Inc., a unit of Nippon Telegraph & Telephone Corp., Japan’s largest fixed-line phone company.[...]
[...]Kazakhstan’s banks may have their ratings cut as the devaluation of the nation’s currency makes it harder for them to repay foreign debt and “substantially increases†credit risk, Moody’s Investors Service said yesterday.
The widening spreads between the interest rates that different euro-area nations must pay bond investors are “worrying developments,†according to a “speaking note†prepared for Luxembourg Finance Minister Jean-Claude Juncker and obtained by Bloomberg News.[...]
Emergency UN Meeting to Discuss Conflict.
Fox News is reporting that another emergency meeting will be held later today at the United Nations. Additionally, the US State Department has begun to evacuate some US citizens from the region.
Monday , August 11, 2008

DEVELOPING @ 2:30 p.m. EDT: The United Nations Security Council has called another emergency session for Monday afternoon, scrambling to resolve the fighting between Russia and U.S.-allied Georgia over the breakaway region of South Ossetia and other parts of Georgia.
Facing Russia’s superior firepower and expanding range of attacks, Georgia requested this latest session, which is to begin at 5 p.m. EDT in New York. Georgia is not a council member; Belgium’s ambassador, Jan Grauls, approved the session as this month’s council president.
It will be the fifth such emergency round of talks the council has held on the conflict since late Thursday night.
Meanwhile, the State Department says it has evacuated more than 170 U.S. citizens from Georgia as the conflict over separatist areas there intensifies between Georgia and Russia.
A spokesman said Monday that two convoys carrying about 170 private U.S. citizens along with an undetermined number of family members of American diplomats based in Georgia have left Tbilisi on their way by road to neighboring Armenia. The spokesman says more convoys are being prepared in case other Americans choose to leave Georgia.

0 Comments