The United States supports Argentina against the court order to deliver YPF actions

Donald Trump’s government supported Argentina on Friday in the dispute that the South American country maintains against a group of shareholders of the YPF oil company in US courts. As he had anticipated, the Department of Justice presented a Amicus Curiae before the Chamber of Appeals in which he opposes the order issued by the Judge of First Instance Loretta Pressa so that the Argentine State delivers 51% of the YPF actions that it has in its possession and that allow it to control the company.

The Appeals Chamber temporarily suspended the Presska Order. The US judicial authorities requested this Friday to remain in suspense to avoid international conflicts and ensure that the judicial process is correctly resolved in the instance of appeal.

The central argument of the brief is the need to correctly apply the principles of foreign sovereign immunity by virtue of the law that regulates this issue. “These issues may have significant ramifications for the foreign relations of the United States, and affect the reciprocal treatment of the United States and their assets in the courts of other nations,” said the Department of Justice in the Amicus Curiae presented to which the country has had access.

Argentine presidential spokesman, Manuel Adorni, expressed his satisfaction for US support – both under the Trump administration as last year with Joe Biden – against the forced transfer of YPF actions to the plaintiffs as part of the payment for the more than 16,000 million that the Argentine State was convicted of paying in the first instance.

Trump’s support forced the plaintiffs, Burford and Eton Capital funds to move. “The beneficiaries of the YPF ruling report to the Court of Appeal that do not want to retain YPF actions in case Argentina triumphs in their appeal,” said X Sebastián Maril, regional director of Latam Advisors. According to Maril, one of the great connoisseurs of Argentina’s litigation abroad, the plaintiffs detailed that “they do not want to administer an oil company and will seek the best way to return the actions.” Even so, they opposed the Court of Appeals to allow the country to resort to the adverse ruling in the first instance without depositing a guarantee.

The trial derived from the renationalization of YPF in 2012 is the most expensive facing the Argentine state outside its national territory. The cause was opened in 2015, one year after the Government of Cristina Kirchner agreed to compensate with about 5,000 million dollars to the repsol oil company for the expropriation of 51% of the shares that the Spanish company had in YPF.

At that time, the Kirchner government took sufficient actions to recover the state control of the great energy company of Argentina, but did not offer the same conditions to the other shareholders, as established by the company’s statute for an operation of that size. The Burford Investment Fund, specialized in international judgments, bought the rights to litigate two societies of the Argentine Petersen group – from the Eskenazi family, owner of 25% of the YPF actions – that had declared themselves bankrupt in Spain. With those rights in the pocket, which grant 70% of the possible compensation, Burford filed a millionaire demand before the US justice for not having launched an OPA especially the YPF shareholding.

Argentina lost the trial in the first instance and was sentenced to pay $ 16.1 billion plus interest to the plaintiffs in 2023. Now it seeks to reverse the ruling in a superior court.

In recent days, Burford and Eton Capital have tried to seek an extrajudicial agreement, which the defendant state opposes sharply. “Argentina is not going to negotiate with the demanding parties and categorically rejects any malicious discussion of parallel meetings,” said Adorni on Friday.