I can’t think of anything worse myself:
In fact, Centerbridge has been one of the most aggressive hedge funds, known as “vulture funds” on the island, amassing sovereign debt for pennies on the dollar and squeezing the island’s government for full repayment. Centerbridge was one of several firms that long concealed its Puerto Rican debt holdings through shell companies. It sat on the steering committee of a coalition of bondholders known as the Ad Hoc group, which fought relentlessly in court for full repayment on $4.5 billion in constitutionally guaranteed general obligation bonds.
Centerbridge there was asking that government keep its word. Even, going to court to try to insist that government be held to the contract that government had signed.
I mean, I ask you, whatever next? Government should do what government said it would do? Isn’t that fascism?
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The other aspect of this is that those who oppose "vulture" funds are essentially insisting that the holders of distressed government securities should not be allowed to sell them to someone with greater inclination or ability to try to wring some value out of them. I'm sure there would be a tremendous market for securities that could only be sold to an original purchaser who is then never allowed to resell them but must hold them, by law, until maturity. I suppose in a fair and just world as envisioned by the progressives, that would be the case.
If people could trust governments to keep their word vulture funds would exist.
Yes, when the usual culprits are trying to author a plan for Puerto Rico to get past its thievery, how dare owners (or replacement owners) actually insist that they want full repayment, that the proposed "haircut" is hardly painless? Like the Paris deal and the Iran deal, negotiators want a successful deal so badly they can't afford to look at its essence, and they berate the investors who can, and who assert their rights.