backKing & Spalding has secured a US$150+ million award, including legal fees, for Italian construction group Webuild S.p.A. (formerly Salini Impregilo S.p.A.) after a decade-long arbitration against Argentina brought under the Italy-Argentina bilateral investment treaty (the “Treaty”) concerning the construction and maintenance of a 60 km toll highway and bridge.
After Webuild and its partner, German infrastructure company Hochtief, completed construction of the project in 2003, Argentina abrogated the US dollar-based tolls that the concessionaire was contractually allowed to charge users. Instead, Argentina set the tolls in devalued Argentine pesos and kept them frozen for the next 11 years, despite rampant inflation. Argentina then repudiated five renegotiation agreements until eventually terminating the concession in 2014.
In March 2023, the three-member ICSID tribunal unanimously issued a strongly worded decision on liability, finding that Argentina’s failure to renegotiate a public works contract for a tollway project constituted a breach of the FET standard under the Treaty. The tribunal held that “Argentina behaved in an arbitrary, grossly unfair, unjust and idiosyncratic manner in not renegotiating the Concession Contract within a reasonable time … [and] conducted itself in an unjust manner when terminating the Concession.” The tribunal issued directions on quantum that accepted Webuild’s damages model, requesting the parties to attempt to agree on minor adjustments to the model.
In June 2023, the parties filed submissions in response to the tribunal’s March 2023 decision on liability. The Argentine Republic asked for reconsideration based on alleged new facts. The tribunal dismissed the reconsideration request in September 2024.
On April 28, 2025, the tribunal issued its final decision on quantum, awarding Webuild over US$150 million, including a substantial share of legal fees. The decision came after a one-year phase on damages in which the parties responded to a series of questions and instructions from the tribunal. Importantly, the tribunal sided with Webuild on all major issues (e.g., valuation date, no risk of double compensation, toll rate revisions and subsidies, among others) and rejected Argentina’s several attempts to reduce quantum. Notably, Hochtief had brought its own ICSID claim against Argentina several years before, complaining of the very same measures, but received an award in December 2016 of US$13 million, which it later settled for a lower figure.
King & Spalding’s team was led by partner Roberto Aguirre Luzi and included the following core members: partners Craig Miles and Doak Bishop, senior associate Eldy Quintanilla Roché, consultant Esteban Sánchez, and associates Arturo Oropeza Casas and Juan Manuel Poggio Aguerre.