00:00Why was PrEPA's bankruptcies temporarily paused? I know we mentioned a Trump-era ruling, but what happened?
00:06Yeah, back in August, the Trump administration decided to fire all but one of PrEPA's board members.
00:12PrEPA is the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority, and it's the main supplier of electricity on the island.
00:19So it's just this vital source for the residents and businesses there.
00:23And the oversight board manages PrEPA's bankruptcy and also the island's finances.
00:31And so the Trump administration wanted to just really change over this board.
00:36So they fired all but one.
00:38And what happened then is the judge overseeing PrEPA's bankruptcy case said, look, let's put this on pause for a second while the reconfiguration of the board works out.
00:49Gotcha. OK. And in terms of a deal with creditors, is there one on the table, even a tentative one?
00:55No. Unfortunately, it's still – PrEPA's been in bankruptcy since 2017.
01:00There's been several different deals that have never really come to pass and really seen the light of day.
01:07So they're still negotiating.
01:10There is mediation going on.
01:14So the hope is that the creditors and PrEPA and the board will once again come together with some sort of a plan.
01:21What is the board working on now? Is it able to do its work?
01:24It is. There are three members that have come back to the board.
01:27There was a separate lawsuit, and the judge in that case said, actually, you know, these members can come back to the board because they – because the Trump administration failed to fire them with proper cause.
01:42So they're back on.
01:43You have a total of four members now on the board.
01:45They're doing their work, and they'll be able to weigh in on PrEPA's bankruptcy if there's an opportunity for that.
01:52When you talk to people about this, what kind of timeline are they projecting for anything to kind of get resolved?
01:58Well, now it looks like it wouldn't be resolved this calendar year, unfortunately.
02:02So we're going into 2026, and the hope is that things will get worked out by then, and the board can actually weigh in on a potential debt-cutting deal sometime in 2026.
02:16Who are the names of the investors, the creditors that you're watching out for here?
02:20Who's going to make headlines?
02:21Yeah, there's a lot of different firms involved here.
02:24You have two main bondholder groups.
02:28One is BlackRock and Nuveen, and the other group consists of Invesco and Alliance Bernstein and McKay Shields.
02:41And so they have their different philosophies on how they want this to move forward.
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