Workshop Presenters

Joel Guedes

Joel leads IPD’s oil and gas strategic and financial advisory services. He specializes in economic modeling for project and business valuation, as well as other strategic and financially oriented analysis. He provides strategy on mergers & acquisitions and joint venture opportunities. He also focuses on issues like financing strategies, including project finance, export credit agency activity, economic evaluation of projects, and valuation of companies and assets. He constantly monitors regional oil and gas activities, supporting IPD’s risk assessment for financial clients exposed to sovereign and corporate risk.

Prior to joining IPD, Joel worked with Venezuela’s PDVSA for 20 years. He was a Senior Advisor in PDVSA’s Corporate Planning Department and, later, a Corporate Manager focusing on financing strategies, PDVSA cash flow analysis and forecasts, oil market analysis for Venezuelan OPEC officials, monitoring of Venezuelan crude oil production, market studies for Venezuelan crude oil and products, and crude oil price forecasts.

Joel is a regular speaker at international conferences like the Bank of America Merrill Lynch and J.P. Morgan Global emerging markets corporate conferences.

Education
Joel holds an MBA from Manchester Business School in the UK (2003), an MSc in Finance from Instituto de Estudios Superiores de Administracion – IESA (1999) and a Bachelor of Arts in Business Administration from Universidad Santa Maria – USM (1995). He also attended a Negotiation Program at Harvard Business School (2004/2005) and the O&G MBA at Institut Français du Pétrole – IFP (2006).

Mark Walker

Mark Walker has 40 years of experience advising more than 20 countries around the world on complex financial matters.

Prior to joining Guggenheim Securities, Mark was head of sovereign advisory at Millstein & Co. and Rothschild London and a Senior Advisor at Lazard Paris. Mark led the Rothschild team that advised Cyprus during its financial crisis in 2013 and co-led the Lazard team that advised Greece in 2011 and 2012 on the first sovereign debt restructuring of a Eurozone country and the largest sovereign debt restructuring ever. Mark also advised the governmental authorities of Greece and Cyprus in their negotiations with the IMF, the European Commission and the European Central Bank and is currently advising the Venezuelan bondholders committee. Mark has worked with the IMF and other official bodies in seeking to improve the practices followed by debtors and creditors in dealing with liquidity and solvency problems of heavily indebted states.  Mark has lived and worked in Paris, Brussels and London and has spent substantial time working in Latin American and Asia.

Mark was a partner at Cleary Gottlieb Steen and Hamilton LLP from 1975 to 2011 and the firm’s Global Managing Partner from 2005 to 2011. He led and co-founded that firm’s premier sovereign practice and developed much of the documentation that set the standard for sovereign debt restructurings during the 1980s and 1990s. Mark received a law degree from Yale Law School and a B.A. in English literature from Stanford University.

• Advisor to the Government of Mexico for more than 30 years on liability management, privatization of the steel, petrochemical and telecommunications sectors bank and capital markets financings and complex international financial matters generally
• Advisor to Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex) for more than 30 years on private investment in the E&P sector, equipment financing, bankers acceptances, infrastructure finance and other complex financings
• European Stability Mechanism: development of a sovereign debt restructuring framework and mechanism to offer debt relief to Greece
• Advisor to South Korea and Indonesia during the Asian financial crisis with respect to the refinancing of their banking systems.
• Mexican Government and Pemex: negotiation of a treaty with the United States governing exploitation of transboundary hydrocarbon reservoirs
• Indonesian state-owned utility (PLN) and Pertamina: renegotiation of 26 independent power projects following the Asian financial crisis
• U.S. monetary authorities: advice as to bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers and design of Federal Reserve Programs to protect systemic banks and keep markets open during the financial crisis
• CFE: the first independent power project in Mexico (Samalayuca)
• Hungary: Euros 10 billion financing of a nuclear power plan expansion with the Russian Federation, advice regarding foreign currency mortgage lending by banks and advice to the government and the central bank on financing the government
• Algeria: advice on a series of industrialization project including transfer of technology, training of workers and construction of plants for the manufacture oil field equipment, consumer electronics, agricultural equipment and other industrial goods
• Advisor to countries in Latin America, Africa, Asia and Europe on liability management, privatization and pubic finance generally
• Advisor to the bondholders of Venezuela
• Advisor to Slovenia regarding its separation from Yugoslavia

Richard Cooper

Richard Cooper is a partner based in Cleary Gottlieb’s New York office. His practice focuses on domestic and international restructurings, including sovereigns and municipal restructurings. Mr. Cooper has represented governments, state instrumentalities, creditors, debtors, buyers and sellers of distressed companies and securities, creditor committees, DIP Lenders, and other participants in out-of-court and in-court bankruptcy proceedings. He has been a thought leader on issues related to the possible restructuring of Venezuelan debt and spoken and written extensively on the subject.

In Latin America, Mr. Cooper has advised on many of the most high profile restructurings in recent years, including, Oi S.A., GVO, OAS, Odebrecht Oil and Gas, Odebrecht Engineering and Construction, Rioprevidencia, Embraport, Mirabela Nickel, IMPSA, OSX-3, and Tonon Bioenergia in Brazil; Empresas ICA, Corporación GEO, Oceanografía, Oro Negro, Cemex, Comerci Mexicana and Vitro in Mexico; Albanesi, San Antonio Oil and Gas, Edenor, Metrogas, Telecom Argentina, and TGN in Argentina; and Automotores Gildemeister and Alsacia and Express in Chile, among others.

Mr. Cooper is part of the team advising the Government of Mexico and the Mexico City Airport Authority in its pending tender offer and consent solicitation, and previously has represented the Government of Colombia in the restructuring of its state owned utility, Emcali, and its largest generator, Termoemcali.

Mr. Cooper has also worked on the U.S. restructurings of Aleris, America West Airlines, Circle K, Color Tile, Continental Airlines, Foxwoods Casino, Fruit of the Loom, Insight Healthcare, Lehman Brothers, M&G Chemicals, Milagro Holdings, Pan American Airways, Revco and Van Camp Seafood, among others.

Mr. Cooper led the team that advised the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico with the restructuring of approximately $73 billion of indebtedness prior to the change in administrations.  He also played a lead role in the development and passage of the federal statute known as the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management and Economic Stability Act, or “PROMESA”, which creates the first federal debt restructuring regime available to U.S. territories, including Puerto Rico. Additionally, Rich led the team that advised the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA), the largest municipal utility in the U.S., in its restructuring of over $9.5 billion of indebtedness and related matters, and the Government Development Bank of Puerto Rico in its negotiations with creditors.

Mr. Cooper was recognized by Law360 as an MVP in bankruptcy and restructuring, by Turnaround Management Association as one of twelve outstanding restructuring lawyers in the U.S. for two consecutive years, by Global M&A Network as a Top 100 Restructuring Professional and by the Financial Times in its fifth annual North America Innovative Lawyers Report for his role in representing a consortium of creditors in OGX’s bankruptcy. He is internationally distinguished as one of the world’s leading lawyers by  The Legal 500 Latin America, Latin Lawyer 250, Latinvex’s Top 100 Lawyers, Global M&A Network, Chambers Global, Chambers USA, Chambers Latin America, The Legal 500 U.S., IFLR 1000, The Best Lawyers in America and Global M&A Network.

David Voght

As Managing Director and founding partner of IPD, David has built the firm’s client-focused services on a platform of efficient, precise, and timely knowledge transfer. He developed IPD’s core consulting methodology to provide high value analysis, based on ethically and locally collected intelligence, for clients navigating highly complex investment environments.

David has worked in energy and general infrastructure development with a focus on business strategy, market analysis, political and economic risk, financing, and business-to-government relations for 23 years. Having resided in Venezuela from 1991 to 2011, David is one of the premier experts on that country’s energy industry. In 1999 he founded IPD, which has offices in Caracas, Mexico City, and Bogota, and provides a network of consultants who advise clients on energy investment throughout the region. From IPD’s base in Madrid, Spain today, David oversees the company’s regional business, which furnishes advisory services to multi-national energy developers, oilfield service companies, foreign governments, and financial institutions.

David publishes and speaks regularly on the Latin American energy industry with particular focus on legislation, regulatory and government issues impacting the day-to-day operations of the oil, gas and power industries, and scenarios for the build-out of new energy infrastructure.

Prior to founding IPD, David was employed at a Washington, DC based consulting firm advising the U.S. Government and multi-lateral banks on infrastructure investment throughout Latin America.