Luis Alberto Moreno
President, Inter-American Development Bank

Luis Alberto Moreno was elected president of the Inter-American Development Bank during a special meeting of the Bank’s Board of Governors at IDB headquarters in Washington, D.C. on July 27, 2005 and took office on October 1, 2005. Previous to joining the IDB, Moreno served as Colombia’s Ambassador to the United States for 7 years. He was appointed to this position in September 1998 by President Andrés Pastrana and ratified by President Alvaro Uribe upon his election in May 2002. Ambassador Moreno oversaw a dramatic improvement in Colombian-U.S. relations during his tenure in Washington. His most notable achievement was the successful effort to build strong bipartisan support in the United States Congress for passage of more than US$4 billion in U.S. assistance programs for Colombia. These resources have contributed to a material positive transformation of the security and economic situation in Colombia. Ambassador Moreno was also instrumental in the renewal and extension of the Andean Trade Preferences Act (ATPA), and was one of the leading promoters of negotiations towards a Colombia-U.S. Free Trade Agreement.

Elizabeth Littlefield
The Consultative Group to Assist the Poor, US

Elizabeth Littlefield is the CEO of CGAP, a multi-donor organization dedicated to building sustainable financial systems for the poor. CGAP was created to set standards, provide technical and strategic advice to financial institutions, governments and development agencies and act as resource center for the microfinance industry. Ms Littlefield comes to CGAP from the investment bank JP Morgan, where she was the managing director in charge of JP Morgan’s financing business in Central, Eastern and Southern Europe, Central Asia, Middle East and Africa until leaving to join CGAP. Prior to this position, Ms. Littlefield held positions at JP Morgan as a vice president and head debt trader for external and local debt in Africa, Eastern Europe and Asia, and as a directeur in JP Morgan’s Paris Office in Corporate Finance, among others. In parallel to her career in investment banking, Ms. Littlefield also spent a year and a half on loan to microfinance institutions in West and Central Africa. She has served on the boards of several international corporations and non-profit companies. She taught as an adjunct professor at SAIS, and was founder of the Emerging Markets Charity in the UK and an NGO that linked homeless shelters to European food banks.

Rafael Llosa Barrios
Gerente General, MiBanco, Perú

Rafael Llosa Barrios asume el cargo de Gerente General de Mibanco desde enero de 2004. Mibanco, el banco de la microempresa, inició sus operaciones en mayo de 1998 como el primer banco privado del Perú que asumió la responsabilidad de concentrar sus esfuerzos en apoyo financiero a la micro y pequeña empresa. Mibanco cuenta con más de 2,218 empleados, 80 sucursales a nivel nacional habiendo otorgado US$2,345 millones de créditos desde el inicio de sus operaciones. El Sr. Llosa es miembro del Comité de Directores de la RED ACCIÓN y Presidente del Comité de Gerentes Generales de la Asociación de Bancos del Perú. Antes de ocupar el cargo de Gerente General de Mibanco, el Sr. Llosa se desempeñó como Gerente de la División de Mercado de Capitales y, previamente, como Gerente Central Adjunto de Finanzas del Banco Wiese Sudameris, Peru (Gruppo Intesa). Asimismo fue Gerente de Finanzas del Banco de Lima Sudameris y Gerente de Tesoreria del Banco Santander. El Sr. Llosa cuenta con una trayectoria de más de 16 años en entidades financieras, es Bachiller en Derecho y Ciencias Políticas con experiencia en Finanzas, Tesorería, Sistemas de Información y Planeamiento. .

Arnaud Ventura
Vice President, PlanetFinance, France

Arnaud Ventura is currently vice president of PlaNet Finance and CEO of MicroCredit, an international investment company that aims to create a network of commercial microfinance institutions in developing countries. Mr. Ventura co-founded and led as CEO of PlaNet Finance from 1998 to 2005. Under his tenure, the organization grew from two staff members to more than 600 staff members with four main business units in over 60 countries. The Consulting and Technical Assistance Business Unit, with total revenues of 15 MUSD, has local offices in 30 countries. The other business units include The Rating Business Unit, PlaNet Rating with a total revenue of about 1 MUSD a year, and the Investment Services Business Unit (PlaNIS) with active portfolio of about 100 MUSD invested in more than 20 countries by the end of 2007. As former CEO of PlaNet Finance, he had the opportunity to led the company’s development in more than 40 countries, mainly in Latin America, Africa and Asia. In 2005, Ventura founded MicroCredit–a 25 MUSD microfinancing holding investment company with core shareholders to include PlaNet Finance, AXA Bank Belgium, SocGen, IFC, EIB and AFD. Before co-founding PlaNet Finance, Mr. Ventura worked for BNP Paribas in France and Argentina as analyst in charge of Retail Banking Development and Information Technology. Prior to that, he participated in the creation of two leading Internet providers in France and Thailand. He holds a diploma of EFREI (Ecole Française d’Electronique et ’Informatique) in Paris and is fluent in French, English and Spanish. Mr. Ventura is currently based in France. Contact: aventura@planetfinance.org. For more information please visit: www.planetfinance.org.

Kurt Koenigsfest
Chief, Executive Officer, BancoSol S.A., La Paz - Bolivia

Kurt Koenigsfest has overall responsibility for BancoSol, a for-profit, regulated microfinance Bank in Bolivia, with 1050 employees, 53 branches and operating out of 9 regions in the country. The portfolio of the bank represents 25% of the market and almost 2.5% of the country’s GDP. Koenigsfest's major responsibilities include short and long-term strategic planning and execution, supervision of senior management, and direct lines of report of the Credit, Technology, Finance & Operations, Marketing & Products, Risk and Legal areas. He is the head of Credit, Compensation & Personnel, Audit, Technology, Budget and Risk Committees. He is responsible for executing the annual budget and leading the organization in reaching long-term and short-term goals, as well as advancing towards the mission and vision of BancoSol.

Paul DiLeo
Managing Partner, Grassroots Capital Management Corp., US

Paul DiLeo is responsible for developing and executing the Gray Ghost Fund's strategy and business plans. He has joint responsibility for selecting investments and managing the asset mix of both the Gray Ghost I Fund and the Gray Ghost Global Microfinance Equity Fund.   Paul has 25 years of experience in investment and international development and was responsible for building the portfolio of the first microfinance fund of funds, Gray Ghost I. His strategy has been to seek out market gaps in the industry which promise superior financial performance and enhanced impact on the scale and scope of microfinance institutions (MFIs) world-wide. As such, he has led the creation of several catalytic microfinance funds including: the Antares Equity Participation Fund, the Short Term Liquidity Facility, the Bellwether Fund (India) and Catalyst Microfinance Investors. Prior to joining Gray Ghost, Paul worked extensively in the field of international finance and development, including the start-up capital of a government-backed investment fund in Russia and equity investments in leading MFIs in India and Bangladesh. He also led assessment teams for dozens of MFIs around the world. Paul, author of an authoritative study of ProFund–the microfinance industry's only equity fund to have successfully liquidated to date–started his career in international finance with the U.S. Treasury and Federal Reserve Bank of New York, focusing on Latin American debt, foreign exchange, and international capital markets. Paul has a Masters from Boston University and a certificate in Business Accounting and Finance from New York University.

Robert Mosbacher, Jr.
President, Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC)

Executive Officer of the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) in October 2005. From 1986 to 2005, Mr. Mosbacher was President and CEO of Mosbacher Energy Company of Houston, Texas, an independent oil and gas exploration and production company. He was also Vice Chairman of Mosbacher Power Group, an independent electric power developer, which began in 1995, and was sold in 2003. He served as Chairman of the Board of the Greater Houston Partnership in 2004, a private, nonprofit organization that serves as the city’s chamber of commerce. He also served as Chairman of the Partnership’s Health Care Advisory Committee, and member and former Chairman of its Education & Workforce Advisory Committee. Mr. Mosbacher has also served as Chairman of the Board of the Methodist Hospital, the Salvation Army, and the Greater Houston Area Chapter of the American Red Cross, all in Houston. He is founder and co-Chairman of Rebuilding Together Houston (formerly PSI HomeSavers), which organizes volunteers to deliver free exterior home repairs and has resulted in the repair of over 4600 houses for qualified low-income elderly or disabled Houstonians. He also served on the boards of South Texas College of Law and the Society for the Performing Arts in Houston. Earlier in his career, Mr. Mosbacher helped to launch the Reagan administration’s Private Sector Initiatives Program, and was appointed by President Reagan to three successive Presidential Task Forces on Private Sector Initiatives during the 1980s. He served as Chairman of the Board of the Texas Department of Human Services from 1989 to 1991, and as Chairman of the Texas Governors’ Welfare Reform Task Force in 1988. During the 1970s, he worked on the staff of Senator Howard Baker of Tennessee. Mr. Mosbacher received a law degree in 1977 from Southern Methodist University and a Bachelor of Arts degree from Georgetown University in 1973.

Martin Redrado
Governor of the Central Bank of Argentine Republic

He is a rare blend of thinker, investment banker, and government policy-maker. He is the former chairman of Argentina's Securities and Exchange Commission, former secretary of State for Technical Education and former secretary of Trade and International Economic Relations in Argentina. A graduate from Harvard, Redrado is an expert on global business, economic issues and founder of think tank Fundación Capital. As chief economist of Fundación Capital, Redrado has created a Center of Economic Research that provides member corporations with current research on trends and prospects in the global economy. , Redrado has worked in Salomon Brothers as financial advisor in the privatization of British Airways, British Gas and Compagnie Financiere de Suez (France), as well as international stock offerings. He later became managing director of International Corporate Finance for Security Pacific Bank, where he structured the placement of Eurobonds for major Mexican corporations, developed asset-backed securities for Mexico's public electrical agency, and swapped over $2 billion in LDC debt for equity in Brazil, Chile, Argentina and Mexico. He is author of several publications, including Cómo sobrevivir a la Globalización (2002), edited by Prentice Hall, and Exportar para Crecer (2003), edited by Grupo Planeta. He was an advisor to the governments of Uruguay, Bolivia, Colombia and Russia.

Helen Alexander
Manager, Procredit Holdings, Germany

Helen Alexander is one of the managing directors of ProCredit Holding, the Frankfurt-based parent company of the ProCredit group of microfinance banks. The ProCredit group comprises 23 banks in Latin America, Eastern Europe and Africa, specialized in providing basic banking services for micro, small and medium-sized enterprises. Today the group has global assets of more than USD 6 billion and 2 million clients. ProCredit is expanding strongly into SME finance in Latin America. In 2007 ProCredit launched three new institutions in Mexico, Colombia and Honduras. Helen Alexander joined ProCredit in 2001 from Bain and Company, an international management consultancy company. Ms Alexander has responsibilities for the strategic direction of the ProCredit group as well as for specific institutions in Eastern Europe and Africa.

Fernando Pozo
President, Felabán 2006-2008, Ecuador

The economist, Fernando Pozo, began his professional career at the Project Development and Evaluation Unit of the National Financial Corporation of Ecuador. He subsequently worked as the Credit and Investment Manager at the Ecuadorian Financial Corporation and also served as Credit and Investment Manager at Banco Continental. For the past 12 years he has worked at the Banco del Pinchincha C.A., and currently holds the post of General Manager at this bank, which is the largest financial institution in the country, with a 35 per cent market share, and with the largest branch office network at the national level. The bank also has an international presence through the Banco Financiero del Peru, Inversora Pinchincha in Colombia and Banco Pinchincha branches in Miami and Panama. At present, the economist, Pozo, is a member of the Board of Directors of several Ecuadorian companies; Director of the Ecuadorian Business Committee, President of the board of directors of the Private Bank Association of Ecuador and President of the Federation of Latin-American Banking, FELABAN. He obtained his professional degree in economics at the Pontificia Universidad Catolica del Ecuador and subsequently obtained his Masters degree in Economic Development at Williams College in Massachusetts, in the U.S., where he was awarded the “LERNER” prize for his thesis titled: “Type of change in actual equili brium in the two gaps framework.” He has also served as a professor at the university level and as a writer for diverse communications media, and in addition has undertaken specialized courses in different academic institutions such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Harvard University, Pennsylvania University and Madison University.

Anna Escobedo Cabral
United States Treasurer, US

Anna Escobedo Cabral was nominated on July 27, 2004 by President Bush to serve as the 42nd Treasurer of the United States. She was confirmed by the United States Senate on November 20, and took the oath of office on December 13, 2004. Immediately prior to joining the Treasury Department, she served as director of the Smithsonian Institution’s Center for Latino Initiatives, From 1999 to 2003, Ms. Cabral served as CEO and president of the Hispanic Association on Corporate Responsibility (HACR), a non-profit organization with a mission to ensure the inclusion of Hispanics in corporate America. Prior to joining HACR, Ms. Cabral served as deputy staff director for the United States Senate Judiciary Committee. The Committee’s jurisdiction ranges from oversight of the Department of Justice and our nation’s criminal and drug enforcement laws to approving federal judicial nominations, and it includes review of immigration, antitrust, patents and trademark, and technology-related legislation. She simultaneously served as executive staff director of the U.S. Senate Republican Conference Task Force on Hispanic Affairs. Ms. Cabral majored in Political Science at the University of California, Davis, and earned a Master’s degree in Public Administration from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.