About

Number of years practice: 15 Law school attended: Escuela Libre de Derecho (Mexico City, Mexico), Katholieke Universiteit Leuven – Faculty of Laws (Leuven, Belgium), Columbia Law School (New York, USA) Languages spoken: English and Spanish Principal practice areas: Project Finance, Leveraged Acquisitions, Structured Finance, M&A Admissions: Mexico, New York

Armando Rivera Jacobo is a member of the board of the Columbia Law School Association and a member of the Project Finance Committee of the New York City Bar Association. He initially trained in Mexico and practiced in the country for a number of years, something which has given him a deep understanding of its legal system and business culture, allowing him to work on deals that would challenge less experienced lawyers. Shortly after joining Debevoise in 2004, Rivera was involved in the securitization of the Monterrey-Cadereyta toll road in Nuevo Leon, Mexico. This was a ‘first-in-its-class’ financing by a sub-sovereign entity in Mexico that required the creation of novel structures to facilitate the funding while remaining compliant with significant legal and constitutional restrictions at both state and federal levels. In 2008 he was part of Debevoise’s representation of AxaGroup in its $1.5bn acquisition of ING’s Mexican insurance subsidiary, ING Seguros, a deal made more complicated by the target’s size and significance to Mexico’s insurance market. More recently he represented Eutelsat Communications in its acquisition of Satélites Mexicanos. The deal was made possible by the 2014 overhaul of the legal and regulatory framework of Mexico’s telecoms sector, meaning that Rivera and the Debevoise team were faced with the challenge of working within a new and largely untested legal framework. What are your predictions for change in the US-Mexico relationship? It is difficult to predict under the current circumstances. However, I don’t think it would be in the interest of either country or their administrations to abandon the great advances towards free trade and investment protection achieved in the past two and a half decades. I do think there is likely to be a renegotiation of NAFTA and other bilateral agreements. After all, there is always room for reopening negotiations [and] in every deal both sides have winning and losing points. Now may be an opportunity to rebalance the trade relationship, [drawing on] lessons learned to improve both sides’ bargain. On the other hand, I also think that Mexico will take this opportunity to make use of its free trade and other international agreements and diversify its trade to become less dependent on the United States, [while] acknowledging that the United States will likely always play the major role. Are there any aspects of the Mexican legal market that you would like to see change? Despite significant improvements, Mexico’s legal system continues to be riddled with numerous requirements and agencies involved in incorporating and starting a business. Further simplification and centralization of the process to set up and assure compliance in the performance of business would probably be welcome. Is there a key economic factor or trend you regard as likely to impact the Mexican legal sector over the next 18 months? The recent significant weakening of the Peso may help strengthen the export sector. However, it also means that valuation of investments in the country will be lower. This may lead to some private equity or other non-strategic investors (and perhaps even some strategic investors that had planned to leave the market in the short term) to hold back divestment plans to wait and see if the Peso trend is reversed and a better return may be obtained. The US Fed has signalled that it may continue to raise interest rates on a regular basis, normalizing monetary policy, which may reduce the pool of cash available for investment in Mexico, as some investors decide to move towards “safer” investments. Are there any sectors you regard as likely growth areas for the Mexican market over the next five years? Probably the same sectors that have been showing growth already, such as the infrastructure and automotive sectors. In particular, those affected by the recent structural reforms, energy and telecommunications. As demand for power increases with the growth in manufacturing and services sectors, the demand for fuel will also increase. One of Mexico’s current challenges is to increase production, to take advantage of its reserves of both oil and natural gas. However, the International Energy Agency has put together a report on the Mexico Energy Outlook that paints a promising picture in this respect. On the automotive side, one cannot ignore the recent move by some US manufacturers to shift production to the US that was previously planned to be performed in Mexico. However, this shift is not major in the overall picture, and many non-US manufacturers remain highly committed to take advantage of the Mexican manufacturing market for their operations in the Americas.