When the news broke that the $1 billion dispute over construction overruns of the Panama Canal would be arbitrated in Miami, a reporter writing a story about this “placing Miami on the arbitration map” called me for a quote. I agreed she was on the trail of a good story, but not because the case made Miami an arbitration player.
The story starts with the fact that several years ago, the ultra-sophisticated parties contracting for work on one of the world’s most important construction projects agreed that future disputes would be heard not in Paris, not in London and not in New York, but in Miami. The parties to the Panama Canal contracts were and are advised by some of the world’s top attorneys who know what is happening in Miami. So, the insertion of Miami as the arbitral seat in the contracts was likely not a happenstance.
