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Hedgie Kyle Bass crying as Singer, Argy dispute deepens

Lesson for Paul Singer: Never come between another hedge-fund manager and his money.

Kyle Bass, the outspoken founder of Hayman Capital, is one of the heavies on the other side of Singer in his battle with Argentina.

But on Wednesday, Bass sounded more like Argentina’s leftist economy minister Axel Kicillof than a US hedge-fund manager.

“Singer is holding poor countries as hostages,” Bass told the Buenos Aires Herald, referring to the recent debt default that occurred as a result of Singer’s legal victory to get full value on Argentine bonds he owns.

That has ended up hurting hedgies like Bass, who is joining George Soros and other euro bondholders in a suit against their trustee, the Bank of New York Mellon in London, to try to get the money owed them.

BoNY held onto $539 million after Manhattan federal Judge Thomas Griesa ordered the bank not to process quarterly interest payments to those bondholders, who accepted a discounted debt swap, unless Argentina also paid holdouts like Singer.

Argentina has refused to pay the holdouts, saying that it can’t afford to do so.

This week, it yanked BoNY’s banking license because it didn’t process the payments, causing a technical default on those bonds.