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Mike Azar Profile picture
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4 Jan, 5 tweets, 2 min read
I rarely talk about my day job, but a project I've been working on for 5 yrs just won "Global Deal of the Year" for 2020. It's a $20+ bn gas project in Mozambique, the largest investment ever in Africa, all during a pandemic & only 3 yrs after Moz defaulted on its Eurobonds. 1/
Mozambique, a country with limited means, defaulted on its debt, hired intl advisors, restructured its debt, did a forensic audit, negotiated an IMF program, all while setting up the legal/regulatory framework for an incredibly complex multi-billion $ new industry. 2/
This was possible b/c Moz has a Gov't which hires the right advisors for the job & listens to them. They didn't drown the population in misinformation, they didn't put ego & personal interest ahead of the national interest, they didn't use clientelism to destroy the economy. 3/
Every non-conflicted intl expert, Lebanese or not, is nearly unanimously in agreement on the path forward. But the country is run by the absolute worst people, in the absolute worst system, and is drowning in disinformation from politicians, banks, and media. It's exhausting. 4/
We don't have to accept living this way...

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More from @AzarsTweets

Mike Azar Profile picture
14 Nov 20
1/ I appreciate the Minister being keen on the forensic audit, but I'm afraid she's making the same mistake that got us to this point: not anticipating the next step. Remember, they have an incentive to convince you that the audit was set up correctly...they set it up after all.
2/ Claiming that banking secrecy & the Code of Money and Credit are *not* obstacles to a forensic audit designed to uncover how deposits were used & BDL losses incurred is simply not convincing. To do this work, you need to track transactions all the way to the final beneficiary.
3/ Read the excerpts from the laws below and tell me if you don't think these laws would hinder that work. A transaction may look legit on the BDL end. You'd need to track it to its final destination to know if the funds were used as intended. You need client transaction data.
Read 22 tweets
Mike Azar Profile picture
29 Oct 20
1/ This is an incredible article. When people have no faith in their institutions, things that should not be leaked get leaked. It's a mix of useful information about the BDL audit and blatant political propaganda and deflection.

forbesmiddleeast.com/preview/blogs/…
2/ First, one point about the leaker. This was clearly leaked from a political side. While I appreciate having this info, this type of stuff should not be leaked and spun in the media. It is unprofessional and hurts the country, and it is misleading in many respects.
3/ The fact is, the failure of the audit is the responsibility of several sides. One side designed it to fail while the other side was so focused on a narrow political objective and acted with such remarkable incompetence and is now trying to deflect blame for its incompetence.
Read 18 tweets
Mike Azar Profile picture
27 Oct 20
Sorry guys I've been on a much needed break, but I heard the forensic auditor may end the contract. At least it's better than doing sub-par work. I only wish these challenges could've been foreseen back in July and repeated over and over in the media👇. It failed by design...
In other news, being outside of Lebanon really makes you appreciate how immature and pathetic our political culture is. I feel incredibly sad for Lebanese people. We should be enjoying nature and the arts, innovating and creating new things, raising everyone's living standards.
Instead, we spend every day on the same tired, unproductive discussions: which politician/banker said what, who upset whom, who's scamming whom. We're stagnating politically, culturally, socially, and economically. It doesn't have to be this way. Life has so much more to offer us
Read 4 tweets
Mike Azar Profile picture
4 Oct 20
1/ Crises like the many Lebanon faces can only be confronted by governments that can take decisive and difficult decisions. Two features of our system impede Lebanon’s ability to do this (which also explain why we keep spinning our wheels screaming about corruption & reforms):
2/
(a) Democracy by consensus among 6-7 competing political factions (mini-govts) that makes domestic politics similar to relations between independent states (i.e., anarchic w/ no "Govt" able to execute policy) & reforms analogues to int'l treaty negotiations between them; and
3/

(b) Communities feel no security, so politics in Leb is “existential” and not “policy-oriented”, so policy is nonexistent & communities can’t hold leaders accountable for failed policies because they fear harming their sect’s security interests & relative power vs the others
Read 20 tweets
Mike Azar Profile picture
3 Oct 20
1/ BDL Foreign Assets (FA) decrease $9.8bn from Mar-Sept. FA includes BDL's FX loans to banks (~$8bn). Financial Sector Deposits are also down $5.6bn. We suspected the big decreases in FA was partly due to banks using their deposits at BDL to repay their loans from BDL
2/ If the full $5.6bn reduction in Financial Sector Deposits is because of its use repaying bank's FX loans from BDL, that leaves $4.2bn real reduction in FX reserves. The trade deficit was supposedly ~$3.6-4bn during this time. That leaves few hundred million dollars unexplained
3/ BDL confirmed the above (that big reductions in FA is b/c of repayment of bank FX loans). But there is no transparency, so it's rational to assume there is capital flight happening. Plus, the trade deficit itself likely contains capital flight b/c it can be easily gamed.
Read 5 tweets
Mike Azar Profile picture
22 Sep 20
1/ The appointment of 3 political cronies w/ no expertise to coordinate technical & investigative work of the BDL auditors means millions of your $ deposits will be squandered, months we don’t have will be wasted, & forensic audit (with all its limitations) is fully politicized.
2/ It isn’t just the forensic audit. Remember a regular financial audit is being done at the request of IMF and donor countries. This is technical work and requires a competent technical team to coordinate and oversee. MOF is undermining future IMF negotiations & financial rescue
3/ The audits should be suspended & any forensic audit results rejected completely until a committee of independent professionals is appointed and all of the other issues we’ve raised are addressed.
Read 4 tweets

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