castro is famous for his debt defaults and any banker who would do business with him damn well deserves to lose his money. An impressive banker for Citibank, named Bill Rhodes, reminisced about his banking experiences around the world for the Financial Times, and though these restructurings didn't involve Cuba, he was always the man who could arrange bailouts for any third world hellhole. He never bailed out Cuba, but he did have a run-in with castro, who had trouble keeping his word.
Right now, I like this guy Rhodes because he's working to help our anticommunist, anti-Castro, anti-Chavez ally, Colombia, get the free trade pact it's earned from our deadbeat Democrat congress. He seems to be wise to how the world works and what's needed.
Anyway, Rhodes bailed out pretty much every third world basketcase who asked by restructuring their debts. This included Marxist Nicaragua in 1979, when the Sandinistas first took power. castro somehow got involved with this restructuring, no surprise, and promised Rhodes a box of cigars if he got it done in a certain time. Well, that's pretty cheap considering what Rhodes was doing, but nevermind, Rhodes got it done the way he had always got it done, on time and under budget, but castro didn't bother with the cigars ... until many years later, saying he was 'busy.' In this FT story, that is how the castroites tried to spin it, and if you read to the very last graf of this story, you'll see how they tried to justify castro's slow-pay. I am sure the banker was not counting on the bearded beast and in any case, it didn't matter because Rhodes had led a significantly constructive life. castro has led exactly the opposite, not even being a man of his word unless he wanted something. I am sure he did this time with Rhodes too.