At the same time as Puerto Rico is receiving stark news of impending financial troubles from economists and wall street advisers across the board, the Secretary of Economic Development and Commerce Alberto Baco is dismissing their warnings, since according to him “economists only focus on the negative.” Metro has the full report on the expressions of the territorial government’s secretary during the Puerto Rico Tech Summit, where he also dismissed the opinions of business owners who oppose Puerto Rico Governor Alejandro Garcia Padilla‘s plans to implement a business to business tax, that many fear will result in a net tax increase for consumers, stifling the already disappearing economic recovery, while not meeting the revenue projections necessary to avoid further financial troubles.
This report comes on the same day Caribbean Business reported that Alexandra Lebenthal, CEO of Lebenthal and Company, advised municipal bond investors to stay away from Puerto Rico’s bond due to the high level of debt and near-certain possibility of a credit rating downgrade to junk status.
The statement by the secretary falls in line with what some see as the general disposition of the current territorial administration of carelessness when it comes to the financial situation of Puerto Rico and its credit rating, which currently stands just one notch above junk status. Several weeks ago, Governor Padilla expressed how he did not care what opinion the accrediting agencies had of him.
Perhaps investors and credit agencies do care.
