And lastly, the Suriname amounts were pretty trivial in the context of the overall negotiations, less than $10 million total. $80 million from ZESCO is potentially much more material.

Two things to watch: while Suriname pledged that it would pursue a refund, and eventually to include erroneous payments in restructuring to ensure comparability of treatment, Zambia (so far) has only said it will seek to count the payment. How will that be worked out?.

@TheoMaret has a great breakdown of that Telesur mixup here (. While it didn't speak well of SOE (or Suriname MOFP) financial controls, one int'l contact at the time also faulted China EXIM for not taking preventative measures to avoid escrow drawdowns.

This has happened before--twice--in Suriname and did indeed complicate the restructuring process in 2022 and 2023. (h/t @ChinaGSProject) .

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Whether the goal was always to front-run the meetings in Marrakech with an announcement, MOFA simply jumped the gun in its Tuesday press conference, or some other factors were at play is unclear. We'll see what comes next.

It will be very interesting to see what comes out of the Belt and Road Forum next week, and the bilateral between Xi and Wickremesinghe. I’d have guessed we’d see this sort of announcement only after the Forum.

There’s also the smaller question of CDB’s guaranteed loans to SOEs (around $226 mil). These may have Sinosure cover, like the funding for the Katana water project. Sinosure-covered claims were (mostly) classified as commercial in Zambia, but were still a sticking point in talks.

Coordination between CEXIM and CDB has not historically been strong, and Sri Lanka seems no exception, with the IMF noting in March that it had fallen to Sri Lanka’s team to keep CDB posted on official creditor developments.

A CEXIM deal doesn't say much about the prospects of a CDB result, and I’m not sure I would agree with some commentators that this presages rapid progress on the private creditor side in Sri Lanka.

But whatever the contours of the CEXIM deal, as we pointed out in our note on the Zambia deal, the question of CDB will continue to hang over Sri Lanka and other countries looking to restructure loans from China.

We'll need more details on the scope of the debt covered. The latest debt bulletin from June 2023 actually shows CEXIM debt at only $3.9 billion, give or take around $14 mil in guaranteed loans to SOEs, versus the $4.2 billion figure in the announcement.

Much will depend on the details, but our historical renegotiation data is clear about China EXIM’s preferred outcomes, and a pretty straight rescheduling would be my guess when terms are announced.

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RT @YunnanChen: Interesting if it goes ahead, since it seems unlike that it will be through Eximbank export buyers credits, but may be othe….

Finally breaking my Twitter vow of silence to say: today at 9:00 am EST, a SAIS-CARI, wonktastic discussion of China's loan data with me, @KevinPGallagher, @AGelpern, and @D_Brautigam, and Evis Rucaj. @stadenesque @eolander on the mod. Details here:

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