The oil and bond market participants have hardly had time to take a breather after Venezuela’s disputed regional election, as the cash-strapped crisis-stricken country has to make more than $2 billion in bond payments over the next week—payments that it can’t miss because it could otherwise trip the wire to bondholders just waiting for a default. In the past week, the government of the country that sits on the world’s biggest oil reserves failed to pay bond coupons worth a total of $586 million. But these payments have grace periods of 30 days, which Venezuela has made use of. The troubled nation is now gathering the cash to pay the maturities due this Friday, October 27, and next Thursday, November 2. On those days, state-controlled oil firm PDVSA must pay $985 million this week, and another $1.2 billion six days later. These nearly $2.2-billion payments don’t have grace periods […]