DLA Piper LLP (US)

Corporate; Finance

Of Counsel

Diego R. Figueroa-Rodriguez has represented public issuers and underwriters in over 50 taxable and tax-exempt financing transactions involving the issuance of over US$20 billion of general obligation, revenue, lease-revenue and asset-backed bonds. He has represented issuers in areas related to the financing of electric power, highways and transportation, water, aqueducts and wastewater, ports, housing, infrastructure, public buildings, industrial, tourist, educational, medical and environmental control facilities, among others. These financings have involved multiple types of financing structures, including various modes of credit enhancement, insurance, swaps, interest rate hedges, auction rate securities and tobacco settlement asset-backed bonds. Diego has also prepared legislation, executive orders, by-laws and regulations in connection with financing transactions and advised in the post-issuance compliance and restructuring of municipal obligations.

Principally due to his involvement in the art world as a philanthropist, collector and board member at various cultural institutions, Diego’s experience includes advising artists, museums, galleries, sovereign countries, private foundations, collectors, auction houses and non-profit art organizations on matters involving a wide range of areas including business, intellectual property, finance, litigation, tax and real estate.

Diego served as financial and legal counsel to the president of the Government Development Bank for Puerto Rico in a wide range of issues related to the formulation and establishment of public policy, including the design of alternative strategies for the financings offered by the bank related to taxable and tax-exempt obligations, privatization projects and reorganization of government agencies. He has served as counsel to governmental agencies in general legal, business and financing matters, including special projects such as the sale by the government of its ownership in a telecommunications company. Additionally, he has worked with major real estate developers in the financing, design and construction of real estate projects and has studied Chinese law at Renmin University of China, School of Law in Beijing and international law, cultural heritage, and the arts at the University of Siena Facolta di Giurisprudenza in Italy.

English, Spanish

Diego is a member of the National Association of Bond Lawyers, the New York State and American Bar Associations, the Puerto Rican Bar Association, Inc., the Puerto Rican Bar Association of Florida, the International Bar Association, and the Urban Land Institute. He is also a member of the University of Pennsylvania Law School Alumni Association, the University of Miami School of Law Alumni Association, and a member and former director of the UMASS Alumni Association. Diego currently serves as a member of the governing boards of the Museo de Arte Puerto Rico, the Museum Trustee Association, the Fundación Luis Muñoz Marín and in various advisory committees, including one at the Lowe Art Museum of the University of Miami. He is a founder and was co-chair of the Young International Committee of the Museo del Barrio, NYC. He also served as a member of the steering committee of the Bond Attorneys’ Workshop of the National Association of Bond Lawyers where he chaired the Issuer’s Counsel Panels, and is the Vice-Chair of the American Bar Association’s Art and Cultural Heritage Law Committee. Diego is admitted to practice in Florida and New York.

LL.M., University of Miami School of Law; J.D., University of Pennsylvania; B.A., University of Massachusetts