US intervenes in YPF nationalisation court case

The United States Justice Department on Thursday presented a writ to request that US District Court for the Southern District of New York (Manhattan) Judge Loretta Preska reject the demand of Burford and Eton Capital investment funds to embargo YPF assets in order to collect on a ruling over the expropriation of the state oil company obliging Argentina to pay US$16 billion.

This new development came on the same day Donald Trump was officially announced as the winner of Tuesday’s presidential elections.

The US Justice Department stated that the ‘turnover’ order against YPF shares demanded by the plaintiffs "violates the US norms of sovereign immunity, asking Preska to "reject it," as informed by the lawyer Sebastián Soler on his X social network account with an image of the note presented by the US government to the judge trying the YPF case.

"The US government acting as amicus curiae in case of the expropriation of YPF was expected, " considered Fernando Maril who is following the evolution of this trial against Argentina in different international courts due to decisions taken during the presidency of Cristina Kirchner.

Maril said that the US government maintains that certain laws of that country are being violated while at the same time opening up the door to some kind of reciprocity so that in the future Argentina acts the same way with some US company or sovereign asset.

"This does not affect the ruling of US$16 billion, the alter ego or the appeal," explained the regional director of Latam Advisors.

The Burford and Eton Capital investment funds won the litigation over the 2012 expropriation of YPF in the first instance, requesting that Argentina hand over a third of YPF shares as a guarantee of payment of the sentence which at the same time was being appealed in the Appeals Court of the Second Circuit of New York.

The Argentine defence lawyers rejected this and the plaintiffs began proceedings to detect assets which could be embargoed.

In this context the Treasury Prosecutor contacted the Joe Biden administration for an update on the trial, explaining the possible implications of a US federal judge requesting the seizure of assets in another jurisdiction, as explained to La Nación newspaper by official sources.

– TIMES/NA/PERFIL