Banco Popular de Puerto Rico

Chad Lewis is a Senior Director in Fitch�s Global Infrastructure and Project Finance Group and joined Fitch in 2002. Chad focuses on transportation revenue-backed infrastructure as well as sports leagues, facilities and franchises.Since joining Fitch Ratings in 2002, Chad has analyzed and rated public, project finance transactions and public-private partnerships including turnpikes, expressway systems, bridge systems and stand-alone transportation facilities as well other social infrastructure in the U.S., Canada and Europe.Additionally, Chad concentrates on transactions involving the league-wide borrowing programs for the NFL, NBA and MLB as well as franchise, stadium and arena transactions involving all four major U.S. sports leagues, European football clubs, the U.S. Tennis Association and colleges and universities.Chad received his BA in Political Science and Economics from the University of Rhode Island.

As Director of the Debt and Portfolio Management team, Piper Montemayor is responsible for directing and coordinating activities related to the issuance and management of general obligation and revenue bond debt. Responsibilities include the investment of cash and securities, cash flow analysis, reporting and loan portfolio management for all Board financial assistance programs. Ms. Montemayor has previously served as Senior State Debt Analyst for the Texas Bond Review Board as well as Finance Manager for financial programs within the Governor’s Office Texas Economic Development Bank. Ms. Montemayor has finance and program management experience in both the public and private arenas.

Bill Laverty joined FCM in March 2009 with over 34 years of public finance experience. Bill previously served as Manager of Underwriting for Bank of America Securities in New York. In addition, he has served on the underwriting desks of JP Morgan Securities, Dillon Read and Merrill Lynch. In this capacity, he has managed the negotiated underwriting of numerous general obligations and refunding structures throughout the country. Bill Laverty received a BA from Villanova University and an MBA from Boston College.

Mr. Morrison is a Director in the Dallas Municipal Finance office of RBC Capital Markets. He has over 16 years of experience developing and implementing capital plans and financial structures for numerous issuers throughout the region. This has included the issuance of over $25 billion in financings either as Financial Advisor or Underwriter. His responsibilities include providing investment banking and financial advisory services to numerous municipal issuers in the Southwest Region including transportation, cities and counties, special districts and higher education issuers. He has worked extensively with revenue bond transportation issuers such as North Texas Tollway Authority, Dallas Area Rapid Transit, Texas Department of Transportation, Texas Turnpike Authority and the Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport as well as county clients such as Dallas County and city clients such as Austin, Fort Worth and Dallas. Mr. Morrison holds a BS and MS from Baylor University and an MBA in Finance from the University of Texas at Dallas. He is a registered securities representative, currently holding Series 7, Series 27, Series 63 and Series 79 licenses.

Rose Romero has been the Regional Director for the Fort Worth Regional Office of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission since March 2006. In that role she oversees the Enforcement and Examination Programs for the Region. Before beginning her duties at the SEC, Ms. Romero was Executive Assistant United States Attorney for the Northern District of Texas. In that role, she advised the U.S. Attorney in a range of areas of management and administration and oversaw all criminal and civil programs initiated by the Northern District. Ms. Romero joined the U.S. Attorney’s Office in 1989 as an Assistant U.S. Attorney and investigated and prosecuted numerous cases involving white collar fraud, telemarketing fraud, bank fraud, narcotics and money laundering. In 1996, she was appointed Deputy Criminal Chief, Narcotic and Violent Crimes Section, where she served until 1999. Ms. Romero then was selected to work as a resident legal advisor to the U.S. Ambassador to Ecuador where she advised the Ambassador on legal and political issues and assisted local officials in drafting civil and criminal legislation aimed at punishing financial crimes, money laundering and narcotics trafficking. Prior to her appointment to her present position, she also served as District Senior Litigation Counsel in the U.S. Attorney’s Office.Ms. Romero received her BS from Texas Christian University and her JD from Southern Methodist University. She also served in the United States Air Force.

Mr. Abrahams' career at Citi began in 1992 when he joined the Public Finance Department of Smith Barney Harris Upham, a predecessor firm of Citi. Through the course of his career, Mr. Abrahams has worked as a public finance banker, structured products specialists, underwriter and now concentrates on tax-exempt renewable energy.As a public finance banker, Mr. Abrahams concentrated on governmental infrastructure and privatizations. Mr. Abrahams is a recipient of the Citigroup Global Customer Solutions Award in 1999 for his work on the Highway 407 financing in Toronto Canada which, at the time, was the largest privatization ever completed in North America. While part of the Credit and Financial Products Group, Mr. Abrahams completed numerous transactions totaling over $20 billion in notional amount for issuers in virtually every segment of the municipal market. Mr. Abrahams has been the lead structured products banker on some of the largest negotiated derivative transactions completed by the firm in the public finance space including $700 million for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, $1.0 billion for the Dormitory Authority of the State of New York, $1.4 billion for the Chicago Skyway LLC and $600 Million for the New York Jets Stadium LLC.Mr. Abrahams briefly headed MSD’s syndicate effort for tax credit bonds, short-dated floating rate notes and Citi’s Window floating rate product. Mr. Abrahams' broad-based public finance experience and extensive product knowledge allows Citi to provide integrated capital market solutions to the firm’s clients. Mr. Abrahams has an undergraduate degree in Economics from Washington University in St. Louis and a MBA with a concentration in Finance from Columbia University. Mr. Abrahams is a former member of the MSD Diversity Committee.

Vince Sampson is President of the Education Finance Council; the trade association representing nonprofit and state agency student finance organizations. Mr. Sampson serves as the organization’s chief representative on Capitol Hill, with the federal government, and within the higher education community; working to advance EFC’s goal of increasing accessibility and affordability for postsecondary education. Sampson has spoken at several industry conferences, including the Bond Buyer Municipal Summit, ABS East, and the Gates Foundation convening on higher education policy and advocacy and has hosted various industry roundtable discussions. As President, Vince reports directly to the EFC Board of Directors. Prior to serving as President, Vince held the position of Senior Vice President for Government Relations, and Interim President. Prior to joining EFC, Vince served as the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, Policy Planning and Innovation (PPI) in the U.S Department of Education in the Office of Postsecondary Education. Vince also served in Office of Legislative and Congressional Affairs, where he was Senior Counselor with responsibility for oversight matters. He joined the Department of Education in 2007 after serving as Deputy Chief Counsel for the Committee on Resources in the U.S. House of Representatives. Preceding his Hill experience, Vince worked in various capacities in the private sector, most recently as Vice President for Public Affairs at the Association for Competitive Technology. Vince holds a Bachelor’s degree from UCLA as well as a J.D. from Santa Clara University School of Law in California and LL.M. from Georgetown University.

Richard J. Raphael is Managing Director and Head of Fitch Ratings� U.S. Public Finance Group.� The Public Finance Group includes over 100 professionals in four offices around the country who provide ratings and commentary on all type of municipal securities. Rich was previously responsible for the State and Local Ratings Groups.Rich joined Fitch shortly after its recapitalization in 1989 following 10 years with Standard & Poor�s. Rich started up and managed Fitch�s Local Tax-supported Group and later managed the State Ratings Group. He has produced numerous research and rating guideline reports on state and local tax-supported bonds and is a frequent speaker at industry conferences.�Rich is a member and former Chairman of the Municipal Analysts Group of New York (MAGNY) and a former President of the Municipal Forum of New York.� He is also an associate member of the Governmental Finance Officers Association (GFOA) where he serves as a private sector advisor to its Committee on Economic Development and Capital planning. He previously served two three-year terms in the same role to its Government Debt and Fiscal Policy Committee. Rich has also been a trustee of the Citizen's Budget Commission.Rich has received numerous Smith�s Research and Gradings Municipal All-Star awards and received the Career Achievement Award from the National Federation of Municipal Analysts (NFMA) in 2014. Rich was awarded the Austin Koenen Career Achievement Award from The Municipal Forum of New York in 2015. �