Lee C. Bucheit: the leader of the economic recovery in Juan Guaidó’s Venezuela

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Lee C. Buchheit, the so-called 'debt guru', was contacted by the opposition government of Juan Guaidó to lead the country's economic recovery

Lee C. Bucheit, the 'debt guru', is Juan Guaidó 's designated official to lead the economic recovery of Venezuela. The 68-year-old lawyer has 43 years of experience in the corporate world, in which he has participated in cases of economic restructuring in countries such as Mexico, Russia, Argentina and Greece, among other successful cases in the region, according to data from La República.

Leer en español: Lee C. Bucheit: el líder de la recuperación económica en Venezuela de Juan Guaidó

A law graduate from Middlebury College and a PhD in Law from the University of Pennsylvania, he has been recognized for reinventing international transactions in asset protection dynamics and collective action clauses. Likewise, he has also stood out for his popular courses in international economics at universities such as Yale, Harvard, NYU and Columbia.

Today, the international expert would be responsible for resolving the most acute economic crisis in the hemisphere, after noticing in 2017 the critical situation that Venezuela's economy. This advisery service will be a much greater challenge than the one faced in Argentina after the economic default due to the 'vulture funds', since the default with the payment of the debt bonds in the Venezuelan case triples the Argentinian one at its most acute moment.

Read also: Venezuela: how have other countries solved their inflation crises?

Juan Guaidó, interim president of Venezuela, recognized by the United States and other dozens of countries in the world, continues in the struggle to secure his power in Venezuela. However, the appointment of Bucheit shows that the leader of the opposition has as a priority the consolidation of a team that contributes strategically to the restructuring of the Venezuelan public debt scheme.

What is the Bucheit's plan?

According to a statement from the interim presidency of Venezuela, Bucheit will be an adviser to the President's Government in charge of "preparing the necessary work to deal with the inherited debt of the Chávez and Maduro era, which will probably exceed USD $150 billion."

Bucheit's proposal, in the Venezuelan case, would be valuable once the restructuring of a failed scheme of the sovereign debt is achieved. The expert forged his reputation after reusing and reinventing concepts successfully in the most critical economic situations. He is expected to replicate this in a special way in Venezuela, considering mechanisms such as the sale of local assets as a stimulus for the revitalization of the economy.

Likewise, it should be emphasized that Guaidó 's adviser would face his former boss, Mark Walker, who has advised a large group of Venezuelan bondholders in the past after Nicolás Maduro failed to pay. The approximate value of these bonds, according to La República, would be US $ 60,000 million, a total value that must be negotiated after the Venezuelan default.

Considering this scenario, Bucheit's experience is relevant for Venezuela, in terms of debt, since the expert could correctly advise Guaidó's government towards an efficient strategy in terms of debt repayment, as well as in effective actions to combat the fundamental problems of the Venezuelan economy, as would be hyperinflation. However, there is still a challenge on the part of the interim government of Guaidó that must be considered in a fundamental way, because there are still important state sectors that the opposition needs to control to make this type of economic strategies look positive, so the needed mechanisms can be implemented in an integral way.

LatinAmerican Post | Alejandra Caballero

Translated from "Lee C. Bucheit: el líder de la recuperación económica en Venezuela de Juan Guaidó"