A Prickly Dilemma for the Banks

Financiers meet to hunt for a way out of their Latin debt troubles

The three-day International Monetary Conference held last week in Philadelphia had all the trappings of a gala affair. In the evenings, private bankers and government finance officials from 22 countries sipped champagne at the Philadelphia Museum of Art and sampled Viennese pastries in the gorgeous Longwood Gardens of the Pierre S. du Pont estate. But during the daytime closed-door meetings at the Bellevue Stratford Hotel, the business was serious and the mood sober. Bankers were groping once again for solutions to the Latin American debt dilemma, which was threatening...