More Equador 'monster' misery:

Ecuador May Hit ‘True Monsters’ Harder Than Argentina

By Lester Pimentel and Stephan Kueffner

Dec. 15 (Bloomberg) -- Ecuador may saddle investors with the biggest losses in a government bond restructuring since at least World War II after President Rafael Correa fulfilled a two-year pledge to default on debt he calls “illegitimate.”

The country’s three dollar-denominated bonds, with a total face value of $3.9 billion, fell below 25 cents on the dollar following Correa’s announcement on Dec. 12 that he wouldn’t make a $30.6 million interest payment due today, according to JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Investors expect to recover less than the 30 cents that Argentina paid in a 2005 settlement that was the harshest since the war, according to Arturo Porzecanski, an international finance professor at American University in Washington. Correa said in a Dec. 13 radio address that he wants to force a “big discount” on creditors, a group he referred to a day earlier as “true monsters who won’t hesitate to crush the country.”

Bloomberg.com: Exclusive