Court Opinion

ID: 9386726
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-04-13 16:00:45.454488+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:18:08.243280
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USCA11 Case: 20-13039    Document: 69-1      Date Filed: 04/13/2023    Page: 1 of 24

                                                            [PUBLISH]
                                    In the
                 United States Court of Appeals
                         For the Eleventh Circuit

                           ____________________

                                 No. 20-13039
                           ____________________

        CORPORACIÓN AIC, SA,
                                                       Plaintiff-Appellant,
        versus
        HIDROELÉCTRICA SANTA RITA S.A.,
        a Guatemalan company,

                                                     Defendant-Appellee.

                           ____________________

                  Appeal from the United States District Court
                      for the Southern District of Florida
                     D.C. Docket No. 1:19-cv-20294-RNS
                           ____________________
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        2                        Opinion of the Court                    20-13039

        Before WILLIAM PRYOR, Chief Judge, and WILSON, JORDAN,
        ROSENBAUM, JILL PRYOR, NEWSOM, BRANCH, GRANT, LUCK, LAGOA,
        BRASHER, and TJOFLAT, Circuit Judges. 1
        JORDAN, Circuit Judge:
                The United States is a signatory to the New York Conven-
        tion, a treaty which regulates international arbitration awards. See
        Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbi-
        tral Awards, June 10, 1958, 21 U.S.T. 2517, 330 U.N.T.S. 4739. Con-
        gress has implemented the Convention through Chapter 2 of the
        Federal Arbitration Act. See 9 U.S.C. §§ 201 et seq.
               Our task is to decide what grounds can be asserted to vacate
        an arbitral award governed by the New York Convention. We
        hold that in a case under the Convention where the United States
        is the primary jurisdiction—the jurisdiction where the arbitration
        was seated or whose law governed the conduct of the arbitration—
        the grounds for vacatur of an arbitral award are set out in domestic
        law, currently Chapter 1 of the FAA. And we overrule Industrial
        Risk Insurers v. M.A.N. Gutehoffnungshutte GmbH, 141 F.3d
        1434, 1445–46 (11th Cir. 1998), and Inversiones y Procesadora
        Tropical INPROTSA, S.A. v. Del Monte International GmbH, 921

        1
         Judge Tjoflat was a member of the en banc Court, having elected to partici-
        pate in this decision pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 46(c)(1).
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        20-13039               Opinion of the Court                        3

        F.3d 1291, 1301–02 (11th Cir. 2019), to the extent that they are in-
        consistent with our ruling.
                                          I
               This case arose from a dispute between two Guatemalan
        companies, Corporación AIC, S.A., and Hidroeléctrica Santa Rita,
        S.A. Pursuant to a contract signed in March of 2012, Corporación
        AIC agreed to build a new hydroelectric power plant for Hidroe-
        léctrica in Guatemala. In October of 2013, Hidroeléctrica issued a
        force majeure notice that forced Corporación AIC to stop work on
        the project. Hidroeléctrica eventually filed an arbitration proceed-
        ing in the International Court of Arbitration to recover advance
        payments it had made to Corporación AIC, and the latter counter-
        claimed for damages, costs, and other expenses. See Corporación
        AIC, S.A. v. Hidroeléctrica Santa Rita, S.A., 34 F.4th 1290, 1292–93
        (11th Cir. 2022).
                The arbitration was held in Miami, Florida, and a divided
        arbitral panel ordered Corporación AIC to return about $7 million
        and €435,000 in advance payments but allowed it to keep what it
        had earned on the contract, about $2.5 million and €700,000. See
        id. at 1292–93. Everyone agrees that the arbitral award was a non-
        domestic award governed by the New York Convention because it
        was issued in the United States in a dispute between two foreign
        companies. See id. at 1293–94; 9 U.S.C. § 202.
               Dissatisfied with the arbitral decision, Corporación AIC filed
        suit in federal court seeking to vacate the award. It asserted that
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        4                       Opinion of the Court                  20-13039

        the arbitral panel had exceeded its powers, a ground set out in 9
        U.S.C. § 10(a)(4), a provision of Chapter 1 of the FAA. See 34 F.4th
        at 1293. The district court ruled that such a challenge was unavail-
        able because under Eleventh Circuit precedent, namely Industrial
        Risk and Inversiones, the grounds for vacatur of an arbitral award
        governed by the New York Convention are limited to those set out
        in Article V of the Convention. The district court therefore did not
        analyze whether the arbitral panel had exceeded its powers. See id.
               A panel of this court affirmed. The panel concluded that it
        was bound by Industrial Risk and Inversiones but opined that those
        cases were wrongly decided and should be overruled by the full
        court. See 34 F.4th at 1292, 1301; id. at 1302 (Jordan, J., concurring).
        We vacated the panel opinion and ordered rehearing en banc. See
        50 F.4th 97 (11th Cir. 2022).
                                           II
               Industrial Risk, decided in 1998, held that when a party seeks
        vacatur of an arbitral award issued under the New York Conven-
        tion a district court can only consider the grounds set out in Article
        V of the Convention. See 141 F.3d at 1446. After setting out the
        purpose of the New York Convention—encouraging the recogni-
        tion and enforcement of international arbitral awards—we stated
        in Industrial Risk that an arbitral award that falls within the Con-
        vention “must be confirmed unless [the challenger] can success-
        fully assert one of the seven defenses against enforcement enumer-
        ated in Article V of the . . . Convention.” Id. at 1441. In so doing
        we cited to a former Fifth Circuit case and a district court case from
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        20-13039              Opinion of the Court                       5

        Delaware, both of which involved a proceeding to enforce (but not
        a proceeding to vacate) an arbitral award under the Convention.
        See id. at 1442 (citing Imperial Ethiopian Gov’t v. Baruch-Foster
        Corp., 535 F.2d 334, 335–36 (5th Cir. 1976), and Nat’l Oil Corp. v.
        Lybian Sun Oil Co., 733 F. Supp. 800, 813 (D. Del. 1990)). We
        noted that the Convention’s “enumeration of defenses” to recog-
        nition and enforcement of an award “is exclusive” under § 207 of
        the FAA, but then read those defenses as also constituting the only
        grounds for vacatur of an award. See 141 F.3d at 1446. In other
        words, we equated the defenses to recognition and enforcement
        with the grounds for vacatur. See id. at 1445-46.
               Over 20 years later, Inversiones adhered to Industrial Risk
        because it constituted binding Eleventh Circuit precedent. See In-
        versiones, 921 F.3d at 1301–02. Although we had previously noted
        some tension between Industrial Risk and BG Group, PLC v. Re-
        public of Argentina, 572 U.S. 25, 44–45 (2014), in Bamberger Rosen-
        heim, Ltd., (Israel) v. OA Development, Inc., (United States), 862
        F.3d 1284, 1287 n.2 (11th Cir. 2017), we concluded in Inversiones
        that BG Group did not abrogate Industrial Risk. See 921 F.3d at
        1302.
              We now consider whether the grounds for vacatur of a New
        York Convention arbitral award are set out in Article V of the Con-
        vention or in § 10 of the FAA.
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        6                      Opinion of the Court                20-13039

                                         III
             Our task is to interpret the New York Convention and the
        FAA. As a result, our review is plenary. See Underwriters at
        Lloyd’s Subscribing to Cover Note B0753PC1308275000 v. Expedi-
        tors Korea, Ltd., 882 F.3d 1033, 1039 (11th Cir. 2018) (treaty inter-
        pretation); United States v. Garcon, 54 F.4th 1274, 1277 (11th Cir.
        2022) (en banc) (statutory interpretation). We begin with some
        background concepts concerning international arbitration, and
        then turn to the language of the Convention and the FAA.
                                         A
               Arbitration awards, including international ones, “are not
        self-enforcing and are only given legal effect through court orders
        and judgments enforcing them.” 3 Martin Domke, Domke on
        Commercial Arbitration § 42:1 (3d ed. 2022). In the usual interna-
        tional arbitration case, the prevailing party goes to court seeking a
        judgment which recognizes and enforces (i.e., confirms) the award.
        The losing party, in turn, opposes recognition and enforcement,
        and sometimes—as here—moves to vacate the award. See CBF
        Indústria de Gusa S/A v. AMCI Holdings, Inc., 850 F.3d 58, 72 (2d
        Cir. 2017); Stephen Balthasar, International Commercial Arbitra-
        tion 794 (2d ed. 2021). For example, Chapter 2 of the FAA provides
        that “any party to the arbitration may apply to any court having
        jurisdiction under this chapter for an order confirming the award
        as against any other party to the arbitration.” 9 U.S.C. § 207.
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        20-13039                   Opinion of the Court                               7

               Confirmation under the FAA is essentially the same as
        recognition and enforcement under the New York Convention. In-
        deed, § 207 of the FAA uses confirmation interchangeably with
        recognition and enforcement: “The court shall confirm the award
        unless it finds one of the grounds for refusal or deferral of recogni-
        tion or enforcement of the award specified in the said Convention.”
        As the Second Circuit has put it: “Read in context with the New
        York Convention, it is evident that the term ‘confirm’ as used in [§]
        207 [of the FAA] is the equivalent of ‘recognition and enforcement’
        as used in the New York Convention for the purposes of foreign
        arbitral awards.” CBF, 850 F.3d at 72. See also LLC SPC Stileks v.
        Republic of Moldova, 985 F.3d 871, 875 (D.C. Cir. 2021) (stating
        that, under § 207 of the FAA, “[c]onfirmation is the process by
        which an arbitration award is converted to a legal judgment”). 2
               Set aside, suspend, and annul under the New York Conven-
        tion are, in turn, generally interchangeable with vacatur under the
        FAA. They all refer to the invalidation of an arbitral award. See

        2
         Strictly speaking, recognition and enforcement are distinct legal concepts.
        Recognition adjudicates the validity (i.e., the binding nature) of an arbitral
        award, while enforcement reduces such an award to a judgment. See Com-
        pañía de Inversiones Mercantiles S.A. v. Grupo Cementos de Chihuahua
        S.A.B. de C.V., 58 F.4th 429, 454 (10th Cir. 2023); Rogelio Vidal, Influence of
        the Arbitral Seat in the Outcome of an International Commercial Arbitration,
        50 Int’l Lawyer 329, 335 (2017). But to be enforced an award must be recog-
        nized. See CBF, 850 F.3d at 72; Nigel Blackaby, Redfern and Hunter on Inter-
        national Arbitration 611 (6th ed. 2015). So in practice enforcement is function-
        ally the same as recognition and enforcement.
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        8                          Opinion of the Court                       20-13039

        Restatement of the Law, U.S. Law of Int’l Com. Arbitration and
        Investor-State Arbitration § 1.1 cmt. uu (ALI Proposed Final Draft
        2019) (“Restatement of International Arbitration”) (“Vacatur is
        largely synonymous with ‘annul’ and ‘set aside’ as those terms are
        understood in the New York and Panama Conventions.”). 3
               Recognition and enforcement “serve different purposes
        [and] request different relief” than vacatur. See McLaurin v. Ter-
        minix Int’l Co., LP, 13 F.4th 1232, 1238 (11th Cir. 2021) (addressing
        the FAA). Recognition and enforcement seek to give effect to an
        arbitral award, while vacatur challenges the validity of the award
        and seeks to have it declared null and void. See CBF, 850 F.3d at
        72; Blackaby, International Arbitration, at 570.
               With respect to judicial remedies, the New York Conven-
        tion allocates different responsibilities to different jurisdictions.
        The country which is the legal seat of the arbitration (or whose law
        governs the conduct of the arbitration) is referred to as the primary
        jurisdiction and its law (the lex arbitri) generally controls the pro-
        cedural side of the proceeding. All other countries which are sig-
        natories to the Convention are considered secondary jurisdictions.
        See Karaha Bodas Co. v. Perusahaan Pertambangan Minyak Dan
        Gas Bumi Negara, 335 F.3d 357, 364 (5th Cir. 2003); CBF, 850 F.3d

        3
         The Proposed Final Draft of the Restatement of International Arbitration was
        approved by the Council and membership of the American Law Institute in
        2019, and represents the official position of the Institute until the Restatement
        is officially published.
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        20-13039                   Opinion of the Court                                9

        at 71; Alan Scott Rau, Understanding (and Misunderstanding) “Pri-
        mary Jurisdiction,” 21 Am. Rev. of Int’l Arb. 47, 49 (2010). 4
                Under the New York Convention, only courts in the pri-
        mary jurisdiction can vacate an arbitral award. See, e.g., BG
        Group, 572 U.S. at 37 (“[T]he national courts and the law of the
        legal situs of arbitration control a losing party’s attempt to set aside
        [an] award.”) (internal quotation marks omitted); TermoRio S.A.
        E.S.P. v. Electranta S.P., 487 F.3d 928, 935 (D.C. Cir. 2007) (“Only
        a court in a country with primary jurisdiction over an arbitral
        award may annul that award.”) (citation omitted); M & C Corp. v.
        Erwin Behr GmbH & Co., KG, 87 F.3d 844, 849 (6th Cir. 1996) (“[A]
        motion to vacate [under the New York Convention] may be heard
        only in the courts of the country where the arbitration occurred or
        in the courts of any country whose procedural law was specifically
        invoked in the contract calling for arbitration[.]”) (emphasis de-
        leted); Restatement of International Arbitration, at § 1.3(a) (“The
        choice of an arbitral seat ordinarily determines . . . the courts that
        have the exclusive authority to set aside the arbitral award.”). An
        award that is vacated is generally a nullity in the primary

        4
          The lex arbitri should not be confused with whatever substantive law (the
        lex causae) governs the parties’ commercial relationship. Parties may select a
        seat of arbitration in one country but choose to apply the law of a different
        country to their dispute. See generally Lindo v. NCL (Bahamas), LTD., 652
        F.3d 1257, 1275 (11th Cir. 2011); Loukas Mistelis, Reality Test: Current State
        of Affairs in Theory and Practice Relating to “Lex Arbitri,” 17 Am. Rev. of Int’l
        Arb. 155, 158-61 (2006).
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        10                     Opinion of the Court                20-13039

        jurisdiction. See Restatement of International Arbitration, at §§ 1.1
        cmt. pp & 4.1 cmt. d.; Blackaby, International Arbitration, at 618.
        Vacatur also has legal consequences internationally, as it is a
        ground on which recognition and enforcement of the vacated
        award may be refused by a court in a secondary jurisdiction. See
        New York Convention, Art. V(1)(e); Zeiler v. Deitsch, 500 F.3d 157,
        165 n.6 (2d Cir. 2007).
               Courts in secondary jurisdictions can only decide whether
        to recognize and enforce an arbitral award. See New York Con-
        vention, Art. III (“Each Contracting State shall recognize arbitral
        awards as binding and enforce them in accordance with the rules
        of procedure of the territory where the award is relied upon, under
        the conditions laid down in the following articles.”). See also
        Karaha, 335 F.3d at 369 (explaining that “a court of secondary juris-
        diction[,] under the New York Convention, [is] charged only with
        enforcing or refusing to enforce a foreign arbitral award”). The le-
        gal effect of the recognition and enforcement (or the denial of
        recognition and enforcement) of an award is limited to the second-
        ary jurisdiction that rules on the request. See Blackaby, Interna-
        tional Arbitration, at 615 (“The immediate consequence of a refusal
        to enforce an award is that the winning party fails to get what it
        wants—namely seizure of the loser’s assets in the place in which
        enforcement is sought . . . [I]t should be borne in mind that [the
        winning party] may still have an award that can be enforced in
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        20-13039                   Opinion of the Court                              11

        another state in which the losing party has assets.”) (emphasis de-
        leted). 5
                                               B
                “The interpretation of a treaty, like the interpretation of a
        statute, begins with its text.” GE Energy Power Conversion France
        SAS, Corp. v. Outokumpu Stainless USA, LLC, 140 S. Ct. 1637,
        1645 (2020) (internal quotation marks omitted). We turn, there-
        fore, to the relevant language of the New York Convention and the
        FAA.
                                               1
                Article III of the Convention calls upon signatory countries
        to “recognize arbitral awards as binding and enforce them in ac-
        cordance with the rules of procedure of the territory where the
        award is relied upon,” under the conditions laid down in other Ar-
        ticles. Article IV then lists the conditions that must be fulfilled for
        recognition and enforcement: “To obtain the recognition and en-
        forcement mentioned in [Article III], the party applying for recog-
        nition and enforcement shall, at the time of the application, supply

        5 Sometimes   the same country can act as both the primary and secondary ju-
        risdiction. This occurs when the prevailing party seeks recognition and en-
        forcement of the arbitral award in the primary jurisdiction and the losing party
        seeks to vacate the award in the same jurisdiction. In such a case the court
        considering the parties’ dueling requests performs a “double role,” exercising
        secondary jurisdiction with respect to the request for recognition and enforce-
        ment and primary jurisdiction with respect to the request for vacatur. See
        Zeiler, 500 F.3d at 165 n.6.
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        12                      Opinion of the Court                   20-13039

        (a) [t]he duly authenticated original award . . . ; [and] (b) [t]he orig-
        inal agreement . . . .”
               Article V sets out a limited number of grounds on which a
        court can refuse to recognize and enforce an arbitral award. It does
        so through two subsections.
               First, Article V(1) provides that recognition and enforce-
        ment of an arbitral award “may be refused” on five grounds: (a) the
        parties to the arbitral agreement were “under some incapacity” or
        the agreement is “not valid under the law to which the parties have
        subjected it . . . or under the law of the country where the award
        was made;” (b) the “party against whom the award is invoked was
        not given proper notice of the appointment of the arbitrator or of
        the arbitration proceedings or was otherwise unable to present his
        case;” (c) the “award deals with a difference not contemplated by
        or not falling within the submission to arbitration, or it contains
        decisions on matters beyond the scope of the submission to arbi-
        tration . . . ;” (d) the “composition of the arbitral authority or the
        arbitral procedure was not in accordance with the agreement of the
        parties, or, failing such agreement, was not in accordance with the
        law of the country where the arbitration took place;” or (e) the
        “award has not yet become binding on the parties, or has been set
        aside or suspended by a competent authority of the country in
        which, or under the law of which, that award was made.”
              Second, Article V(2) provides that recognition and enforce-
        ment “may also be refused” on two additional grounds: (a) the
        “subject matter of the difference is not capable of settlement by
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        20-13039               Opinion of the Court                        13

        arbitration under the law of t[he] country” where, or under the law
        of which, the award was made; or (b) the “recognition and enforce-
        ment of the award would be contrary to the public policy of that
        country.”
                The only reference to vacatur (i.e., “set aside or suspended”)
        in Article V is found in subsection (1)(e). Article V(1)(e) allows a
        court exercising secondary jurisdiction to deny a request to recog-
        nize and enforce a New York Convention award on the ground
        that it has been vacated by a court (“a competent authority”) in the
        primary jurisdiction (“in which, or under the law of which, that
        award was made”). But it does not purport to regulate the proce-
        dures or set out the grounds for vacatur in the primary jurisdiction.
        See Restatement of International Arbitration, at § 4.9 reporters’
        note (a)(iv) (“[I]t is well established that the New York [Conven-
        tion] . . . do[es] not regulate the grounds for vacating Convention
        awards under national arbitration law.”); Reimar Wolff, New York
        Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbi-
        tral Awards: Commentary 7 (Hart Publishing 2012) (explaining that
        Article V “does not harmonize the grounds for challenging an
        award”) (emphasis deleted).
               The other Articles of the Convention—all of which refer to
        recognition and enforcement—confirm that Article V(1)(e) does
        not provide the grounds for vacatur. See Lozano v. Montoya Al-
        varez, 572 U.S. 1, 11 (2014) (“For treaties, which are primarily com-
        pact[s] between independent nations, our duty [i]s to ascertain the
        intent of the parties by looking to the document’s text and
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        14                           Opinion of the Court                20-13039

        context.”) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). Article
        I establishes the limited scope of the Convention in relation to ar-
        bitral awards, stating that the “Convention shall apply to the recog-
        nition and enforcement of arbitral awards.” Article III introduces
        the provisions related to recognition and enforcement, mandating
        that signatory countries “recognize arbitral awards as binding and
        enforce them . . . under the conditions laid down in the following
        articles.” Article IV lists the conditions that must be fulfilled by a
        party “[t]o obtain the recognition and enforcement” of an award.
        Article V then enumerates the only grounds on which “[r]ecogni-
        tion and enforcement of the award may be refused.” And Article
        VI allows a court exercising secondary jurisdiction to “adjourn the
        decision on the enforcement of the award” in the face of a pending
        vacatur application in the primary jurisdiction. 6
                Chapter 2 of the FAA implements the Convention. The two
        texts should therefore be read harmoniously. See Antonin Scalia &
        Bryan Garner, Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts 252
        (2012); William N. Erskine, Jr., Interpreting Law: A Primer on How
        to Read Statutes and the Constitution 121 (2016). Like Article V of
        the Convention, Chapter 2 of the FAA focuses only on recognition
        and enforcement. As noted, § 207 of the FAA directs courts to con-
        firm an arbitral award “unless it finds one of the grounds for refusal
        or deferral of recognition or enforcement of the award specified in
        the . . . Convention.” And Article V enumerates the grounds on

        6 All   the emphases in this paragraph are ours.
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        20-13039                 Opinion of the Court                          15

        which a court exercising secondary jurisdiction can refuse to rec-
        ognize and enforce an award. Not surprisingly, our more recent
        cases have recognized that § 207 and Article V address enforcement
        and recognition. See, e.g., Lindo v. NCL (Bahamas), Ltd., 652 F.3d
        1257, 1263 (11th Cir. 2011) (“Article V of the Convention . . . enu-
        merates seven defenses that—like 9 U.S.C. § 207—are directed at
        courts considering whether to recognize and enforce an arbitral
        award. Article V applies at the award-enforcement stage.”).
               In sum, neither Article V of the Convention nor § 207 of the
        FAA provides the grounds on which a court in the primary juris-
        diction can vacate an arbitral award. In coming to a different con-
        clusion, Industrial Risk “d[id] not track the [text or] logic of the . . .
        Convention.” Charles H. Brower II, Hollow Spaces, 61 Buff. L.
        Rev. 731, 821 (2013).
                                            2
               Chapter 2 of the FAA provides that “Chapter 1 applies to ac-
        tions and proceedings brought under [Chapter 2] to the extent that
        [Chapter 1] is not inconsistent with [Chapter 2] or the Convention
        as ratified by the United States.” 9 U.S.C. § 208. In discussing
        § 208—Chapter 2’s so-called residual clause—the Supreme Court
        has explained that “the [New York] Convention was drafted against
        the backdrop of domestic law,” and concluded that “the Conven-
        tion requires courts to rely on domestic law to fill gaps; it does not
        set out a comprehensive regime that displaces domestic law.” Ou-
        tokumpu, 140 S. Ct. at 1645.
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        16                     Opinion of the Court                 20-13039

               Based on the Supreme Court’s discussion in Outokumpu
        and the New York Convention’s binary framework, we hold that
        the primary jurisdiction’s domestic law acts as a gap-filler and pro-
        vides the vacatur grounds for an arbitral award. Stated differently,
        in a case like this one, § 208 of the FAA contemplates that the
        grounds for vacatur are the ones set out in Chapter 1 of the FAA.
        And because Article V of the Convention is “simply silent” on the
        grounds for vacatur, there is no conflict if Chapter 1 is applied. See
        Outokumpu, 140 S. Ct. at 145. Cf. BG Group, 572 U.S. at 29 (ad-
        dressing, in a case where the international arbitral proceeding was
        seated in the United States, whether the arbitrators exceeded their
        powers under § 10(a)(4) of the FAA).
               This is how the Second, Third, Fifth, and Seventh Circuits
        have interpreted the Convention. Their decisions, which align
        with the language of Article V of the Convention and Chapter 2 of
        the FAA, are persuasive. See Yusuf Ahmed Alghanim & Sons v.
        Toys “R” Us, Inc., 126 F.3d 15, 22 (2d Cir. 1997) (“There is no indi-
        cation in the Convention of any intention to deprive the rendering
        state of its supervisory authority over an arbitral award, including
        its authority to set aside that award under domestic law.”); Ario v.
        Underwriting Members of Syndicate 53 at Lloyds for 1998 Year of
        Account, 618 F.3d 277, 292 (3d Cir. 2010) (agreeing with Yusuf , 126
        F.3d at 23, that “‘[t]he Convention specifically contemplates that
        the [country] in which, or under the law of which, the award is
        made, will be free to set aside or modify an award in accordance
        with its domestic arbitral law’” and explaining that “[w]hen both
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        20-13039               Opinion of the Court                      17

        the arbitration and the enforcement of the award falling under the
        Convention occur in the United States, there is no conflict between
        the Convention and the domestic FAA”); Karaha Bodas, 335 F.3d
        at 368 (“By its silence on the matter, the Convention does not re-
        strict the grounds on which primary-jurisdiction courts may annul
        an award, thereby leaving to a primary jurisdiction’s local law the
        decision whether to set aside an award.”); Lander Co. v. MMP
        Invs., Inc., 107 F.3d 476, 478 (7th Cir. 1997) (“[T]he New York Con-
        vention contains no provision for seeking to vacate an award, alt-
        hough it contemplates the possibility of the award’s being set aside
        in a proceeding under local law . . . and recognizes defenses to the
        enforcement of an award.”).
               The Restatement of International Arbitration reads the Con-
        vention in the same manner: “[T]he exclusive vacatur grounds
        [where the arbitration is seated in the United States] are those set
        out in FAA § 10. This interpretation is supported by the text of the
        New York Convention—which does not purport to regulate the
        grounds for vacating awards at the arbitral seat—and of the FAA,
        as well as by the majority of the U.S. courts of appeal to have ad-
        dressed the issue.” Restatement of International Arbitration, at §
        4.9 cmt. a. See also id. at § 4.14 cmt. a (“The scope and proper
        exercise of set-aside authority are determined by the arbitration
        law of the country in which or under the law of which the award
        was made.”). And so do most international arbitration scholars.
        See James H. Carter & John Fellas, International Commercial Ar-
        bitration in New York §§ 1.88, 1.91 (2d ed. 2016) (“Nondomestic
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        18                     Opinion of the Court                20-13039

        arbitral awards issued by a tribunal seated in the United States or
        made pursuant to U.S. arbitration law may be vacated under U.S.
        arbitration law. . . . This means that U.S. courts may vacate awards
        made in the United States relying on the grounds listed in [§] 10 of
        the FAA[.]”); Blackaby, International Arbitration, at 635 (“[T]he
        New York Convention does not in any way restrict the grounds on
        which an award may be set aside . . . by the court of [primary juris-
        diction]. This is a matter that is left to the domestic law of the
        country concerned.”); Albert Jan van den Berg, The New York Ar-
        bitration Convention of 1958: Towards a Uniform Judicial Inter-
        pretation 95 (1981) (“[T]he grounds on which the award has been
        set aside in the country of origin can be any ground set out in the
        arbitration law of that country.”); Wolff, New York Convention, at
        367 (“The NYC sets neither any standards nor any limits for the
        courts of the State where the award was rendered for their deci-
        sion-making process as to setting aside or suspending the award.
        An application to set aside the award in the country of origin is
        governed by the domestic law of the seat State.”) (emphasis de-
        leted); Lea H. Kuck & Amanda R. Kalantirsky, Vacating an Inter-
        national Arbitration Award Rendered in the United States: Does
        the New York Convention, the Federal Arbitration Act or State
        Law Apply?, 3 Arb. L. Rev. 4, 7 (2011) (“The Convention contains
        no description of or limitation on the capacity of the jurisdiction
        where the award was rendered to apply its own law vacating the
        award. This means that the parties’ choice of the seat of arbitration
        can have significant consequences for any judicial review of the
        award.”).
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        20-13039                Opinion of the Court                        19

                We recognize that one leading international arbitration trea-
        tise defends Industrial Risk (and, by definition, Inversiones). See
        Gary B. Born, International Commercial Arbitration 3211 (3d ed.
        2021) (asserting that the reference to the Convention in § 207 of the
        FAA “does not include the more expansive bases for vacatur under
        § 10 of the domestic FAA and, on the contrary, was included in
        § 207 precisely to avoid consideration of § 10’s domestic vacatur
        grounds in recognition actions”). But that treatise glosses over the
        critical fact that the Convention does not set out any grounds for
        vacatur, ignores the differences between recognition/enforcement
        and vacatur, and fails to account for the varied roles of courts in
        primary and secondary jurisdictions in post-award judicial proceed-
        ings. It also does not satisfactorily address § 208’s command that
        Chapter 1 of the FAA—including its § 10 vacatur grounds—applies
        in New York Convention cases as long as there is no conflict.
                                          C
               Hidroeléctrica contends that applying domestic grounds to
        the vacatur of international arbitral awards would run counter to
        the New York Convention’s objective of standardizing the treat-
        ment of such awards. See, e.g., Richard W. Hulbert, The Case for
        Coherent Application of Chapter 2 of the Federal Arbitration Act,
        22 Am. Rev. of Int’l Arb. 45, 72 (2011) (“An intention that incon-
        sistent standards are to be applied to the validity of an award falling
        under the Convention, by the same court in the same case between
        the same parties, depending on whether the issue is to confirm the
        award (at the suit of the winner) or to vacate it (at the suit of the
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        20                     Opinion of the Court               20-13039

        loser), cannot easily (or even plausibly be imputed to Congress.”)).
        We are not persuaded.
               The argument may have some appeal on policy grounds,
        but it starts from a faulty premise—it wrongly presumes that the
        Convention seeks to prescribe comprehensive standards which dis-
        place domestic law across the board. See Outokumpu, 140 S. Ct.
        at 1645. “While it would have provided greater reliability to the
        enforcement of awards under the Convention had the available
        grounds [for vacatur] been defined in some way, such action would
        have constituted meddling with national procedure for handling
        domestic awards, a subject beyond the competence of the Confer-
        ence.” Leonard V. Quigley, Accession by the United States to the
        United Nations Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement
        of Foreign Arbitral Awards, 70 Yale L.J. 1049, 1069–70 (1961). The
        Convention, which does not provide the grounds for vacatur, can-
        not attempt to make uniform that which it does not address.
                                         D
               Hidroeléctrica also argues that, even if Industrial Risk and
        Inversiones were wrongly decided, principles of stare decisis coun-
        sel against overruling them because of the settled expectations they
        have created. Hidroeléctrica is correct that “[o]verruling precedent
        is never a small matter,” Kimble v. Marvel Ent., LLC, 576 U.S. 446,
        455 (2015), but here we conclude that it is appropriate.
               Though stare decisis is a hallmark of our judicial system, it
        “is not an inexorable command[.]” McKinney v. Pate, 20 F.3d 1550,
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        20-13039               Opinion of the Court                       21

        1565 n.21 (11th Cir. 1994) (en banc) (citation omitted). We may
        overrule a prior case that is “plainly and palpably wrong” if doing
        so would not “result in more harm than continuing to follow the
        erroneous decision.” McCarthan v. Dir. of Goodwill Indus.-Sun-
        coast, Inc., 851 F.3d 1076, 1096 (11th Cir. 2017) (en banc) (citation
        omitted).
               In deciding whether to overrule precedent, we consider “the
        quality of the decision’s reasoning; its consistency with related de-
        cisions; legal developments since the decision; and reliance on the
        decision.” Ramos v. Louisiana, 140 S. Ct. 1390, 1405 (2020) (cita-
        tion omitted). Here these factors weigh in favor of overruling
        those aspects of Industrial Risk and Inversiones which hold that Ar-
        ticle V of the New York Convention provides the vacatur grounds
        for an arbitral award.
               For starters, Industrial Risk and Inversiones are wrong, and
        clearly so. They fail to analyze the text of the New York Conven-
        tion or of Chapter 2 of the FAA. And they improperly conflate
        recognition and enforcement with vacatur by ignoring the different
        roles given to primary and secondary jurisdictions in post-award
        judicial proceedings under the Convention.
               In addition, Industrial Risk and Inversiones are outliers.
        They are in significant tension with the Supreme Court’s under-
        standing of the Convention in Outokumpu, 140 S. Ct. at 1645, and
        they directly conflict with the decisions of our sister circuits.
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        22                     Opinion of the Court                20-13039

                In evaluating whether a prior decision “causes ‘more harm
        than good’ we . . . evaluate a range of consequences.”
        SmileDirectClub, LLC v. Battle, 4 F.4th 1274, 1285 (11th Cir. 2021)
        (en banc) (W. Pryor, C.J., concurring) (citation omitted). In this
        respect, some commentators have noted that if left undisturbed In-
        dustrial Risk and Inversiones may affect how we interpret and ap-
        ply the Inter-American Convention on International Commercial
        Arbitration (popularly known as the Panama Convention), Jan. 30,
        1975, S. Treaty Doc. No. 97–12, 1438 U.N.T.S. 245, which Congress
        implemented through Chapter 3 of the FAA, 9 U.S.C. §§ 301 et seq.
        See Juan C. Garcia & Ivan Bracho Gonzalez, Interpretation of Arti-
        cle V of the New York Convention in the Eleventh Circuit: Indus-
        trial Risk Insurers, 74 U. Miami L. Rev. 1080, 1108 (2020).
                Although we do not address the Panama Convention today,
        we note that its enforcement and recognition provisions are “sub-
        stantively identical” to those in the New York Convention. See
        Esso Expl. & Prod. Nigeria Ltd. v. Nigerian Nat’l Petroleum Corp.,
        40 F.4th 56, 62 n.2 (2d Cir. 2022); TermoRio, 487 F.3d at 933. Re-
        lying on the panel decision in this case, one of our recent decisions
        states that the “Panama Convention lists seven defenses which pro-
        vide the exclusive grounds for vacatur.” Técnicas Reunidas de
        Talara S.A.C. v. SSK Ingenería y Construcción S.A.C., 40 F.4th
        1339, 1344 (11th Cir. 2022) (citing Corporación AIC, 34 F.4th at
        1298). This statement in Técnicas Reunidas equating recognition
        and enforcement with vacatur was arguably dicta because the case
        was decided solely on waiver grounds, see 40 F.4th at 1345-46, but
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        20-13039               Opinion of the Court                       23

        it nevertheless shows that Industrial Risk and Inversiones may not
        be limited to the New York Convention and may spill over to the
        Panama Convention.
                We acknowledge that Industrial Risk and Inversiones may
        have created certain reliance interests. But those interests, we
        think, are relatively minor. First, there are two sets of parties who
        might be detrimentally affected by our decision today: (a) those
        whose arbitral proceedings under the New York Convention (i) are
        seated somewhere within the Eleventh Circuit and (ii) are cur-
        rently ongoing; and (b) those whose agreements stipulate to an ar-
        bitral location within the Eleventh Circuit but have not yet initi-
        ated arbitration proceedings. Whether those parties number in the
        single, double, or triple digits is anyone’s guess. Second, we do not
        know which, if any, of these parties chose to conduct their arbitral
        proceedings in the Eleventh Circuit because of Industrial Risk and
        Inversiones. Cf. Franchise Tax Bd. of Cal. v. Hyatt, 139 S. Ct. 1485,
        1499 (2019) (“[C]ase-specific costs are not among the reliance inter-
        ests that would persuade us to adhere to an incorrect resolution of
        an important constitutional question.”).
                                         IV
               We hold that in a New York Convention case where the ar-
        bitration is seated in the United States, or where United States law
        governs the conduct of the arbitration, Chapter 1 of the FAA pro-
        vides the grounds for vacatur of an arbitral award. To the extent
        that Industrial Risk and Inversiones are inconsistent with this hold-
        ing, we overrule them.
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        24                         Opinion of the Court                       20-13039

               The district court correctly followed Industrial Risk and In-
        versiones, which constituted binding precedent at the time, and de-
        clined to address Corporación AIC’s argument that the arbitral
        award should be vacated because the panel exceeded its powers
        under 9 U.S.C. § 10(a)(4). We vacate the judgment in favor of Hi-
        droeléctrica and remand for the district court to consider Corpo-
        ración AIC’s § 10(a)(4) contention. 7
                VACATED and REMANDED.

        7
         We decline Hidroeléctrica’s invitation to decide the § 10(a)(4) issue ourselves.