15:22 Jun 9, 2006 

Thanks to all of you for your contributions. I agree that the verb (if it actually exists) is very ugly! Based on Miguel's suggestion (which I think is the most correct in this instance - the country is Colombia by the way) I am thinking of translating the sentence as follows: "Faced by the dramatic contraction of liquidity in the economy, the financial organisations found it difficult to obtain the resources required to support a portfolio to which they were committed for 15 years, in which bad debts began to increase until they reached a peak of 25% of the total portfolio." Would that be correct?

14:58 Jun 9, 2006