Puerto Rico News Digest For May 18, 2015

CARRAIZO RESERVOIR LEVEL SLIGHTLY UP

After a rainy weekend, the Carraízo reservoir in Trujillo Alto showed
some improvement in its water levels this morning. The reservoir's level
had increased by 64 centimeters Monday morning, with an overall level
of 37.01 meters. This brings Carraízo close to the level it displayed little
over a week ago. Since last Wednesday, the 160,000 water customers
that receive water from Carraízo have been under a 24 hour water ratio-
ning plan. The President of the island's public water company (AAA),
Alberto Lázaro, stated that the higher water level "buys us about six to
eight days", in reference to the possibility of increasing the water ratio-
ning periods to 48 instead of 24 hours.

FINES FOR HIRING UNLICENSED HVAC TECHS

From Caribbean Business:

In an effort to protect consumers from being victims of fraudulent ser-
vices when installing an air-conditioning or refrigeration unit for either
commercial or personal use, a communications campaign wants to deli-
ver an important consumer alert. Any person who contracts the services
of an unlicensed air-conditioning and refrigeration technician to install
refrigeration equipment both for personal or commercial uses will be
fined up to $500. “Many people don’t know that this is an established
law,” informs Antonio Figueroa Rey, president of Colegio de Técnicos
de Refrigeración y Aire Acondicionado de Puerto Rico (CTRAPR), or
Association of Refrigeration and Air Conditioning Technicians.

PREPA CREDITORS PUSH FOR DEAL

From The San Juan Daily Star:

Another group of creditors of the Puerto Rico Electric Power Autho-
rity (PREPA) is pursuing negotiations to shore up the cash-strapped
public corporation, seeking to avoid putting a receiver in charge of
a debt restructuring, the co-founder of a hedge fund that owns some
of the utility’s debt told Bloomberg. But PREPA insists on its own
debt restructuring plan, to be delivered on June 1. “Rather than go
that route, we and other bondholders have put forward a proposal,”
Tom Wagner, the cofounding partner of New York-based hedge-fund
firm Knighthead Capital Management, said in an interview on Bloom-
berg Television. “We are focused on trying to find a capital markets
solution to resolve the problem.”

PR TO LAUNCH INVESTMENT SUMMIT

From Fox News Latino:

Puerto Rico this coming week will try to sell itself to Latin American
and Spanish investors as one of the hemisphere's best locations in which
 to invest, an effort to attract foreign capital to help it pull out of the re-
cession in which it has been mired for almost a decade. To accomplish
that, the island's government has organized the third so-called Puerto
Rico Investment Summit, which on this occasion will focus for two days
on potential investors from Latin America, Spain and the U.S. Hispanic
community. According to figures provided by the Puerto Rican govern-
ment, the Condado Vanderbilt Hotel on Monday will host some 150
potential investors for the summit.

GDB'S LIQUIDITY DOWN TO $1.02B

From News Is My Business:

The Government Development Bank for Puerto Rico released its most
recent liquidity statement late last week, showing a balance of $1.02
billion net as of April 30, representing a drop from the $1.11 billion the
agency reported for the prior month.