PUERTO RICO Trends and Developments Contributed by: Ricardo F. Casellas Sánchez and Carla S. Loubriel Carrión, Casellas Alcover & Burgos
Constructora Estelar governed the analysis, however, judicial review of the award would have been de novo or far less deferential. Collateral enforcement litigation of the final award fol - lowed in federal and state courts. Invoking complete diversity jurisdiction, Bacardí sought to enforce the award in federal court arguing that the FAA provided the exclusive grounds for review and confirmation of the award. Bacardí argued that V. Suarez’s petition to vacate in Puerto Rico state court would be prejudicial because judicial review under Puerto Rico law per - mitted scrutiny of the legal correctness of the award. Eventually, the federal case reached the First Circuit, where it reversed the dismissal by the district court on procedural grounds but stayed the case pending confirmation proceedings in state court. Meanwhile, the state trial court confirmed the award under the FAA and the intermediate appellate court affirmed. V . Suárez v Bacardí , KLCE201201176, 2013 WL 4037215 (TA June 25, 2013). Although the dichotomy created by two standards of review precipitated collateral liti - gation, no conflict of laws materialised in those cases because the state court correctly applied Hall Street rather than Constructora Estelar , which V. Suarez had urged. Against that backdrop, the significance of the AAPR comes into focus. What the AAPR accomplishes is de facto to revoke Constructora Estelar because the narrow grounds it provides for judicial review of awards track the FAA and do not allow vacatur for errors of law. The threshold question is: when does the AAPR apply? Article 1.02 of the AAPR provides that it applies to arbitration agreements “subject to the laws of Puerto Rico”, regardless of the date of execution of such agreements. The phrase “subject to the laws of Puerto Rico” is not defined by the AAPR. There are two reasonable meanings. Under the first, a choice of law clause in the arbitration agreement also refer - ences Puerto Rico law, so the arbitration is subject to its laws. Under the second, where the agreement contains a choice of law clause pointing to another jurisdiction or none at all, a strong public policy of Puerto Rico requires applying its laws to the arbitrable claims at issue.
A third question, not apparent from the text of Article 1.02, is temporal. The reference to the date of exe - cution suggests that the AAPR reaches agreements concluded before August 2024. Yet in the first deci - sion of the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico to address arbitration after the AAPR came into force – Sierra Lugo v Sunrun PR Operations , LLC , 2026 TSPR 76 (10 July 2026), discussed below – the Court applied the repealed Commercial Arbitration Act of 1951 to an agreement executed in 2020 and litigated from 2023, on the ground that it was the statute in force at the time of the events in controversy. The point was not briefed, and the Court did not mention Arti - cle 1.02 of the AAPR, so the treatment is best read as sub silentio rather than as a holding on temporal reach. Until the question is squarely presented, parties litigating pre-2024 agreements should be prepared to brief which statute governs, and drafters of new agreements should consider stating expressly that the AAPR applies. If the AAPR applies, the next issue is what the inter - play is among the AAPR, the FAA, and the parties’ adoption of rules for arbitration in a contract, such as the AAA’s Commercial Arbitration Rules. On this matter, the AAPR’s Statement of Motives is explicit. The AAPR is not meant to displace the rules for the administration of the arbitration but rather to supple - ment them, if the parties have agreed to incorporate them. In turn, the AAA’s Commercial Arbitration Rules coexist with federal and state arbitration statutes when applicable to arbitration agreements. One example is the remedy of injunctions in aid of arbitration. Before the enactment of the AAPR, the remedy was grounded on jurisprudence. The AAPR codifies the remedy in Article 2.06, which allows a party to file a motion in state court and, upon a show - ing of cause, obtain equitable relief until the appoint - ment of an arbitrator. The motion would authorise the court to grant provisional remedies on the same grounds that such relief is available under the Puerto Rico Rules of Civil Procedure. For its part, the recently amended AAA Commercial Rules for Complex Cases also allow for the appointment by the AAA (within 24 hours) of an arbitrator solely for considering a request for emergency injunctive relief. That arbitrator must make the same pre-hearing disclosures as a party-
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