Polibio Valenzuela Scheker focuses his practice on financial services and corporate and securities matters. Polibio represents lenders and borrowers in working capital loans, asset-based financings and project finance deals; underwriters in Rule 144-A securities offerings; and private entities in restructuring and reorganizations. He also advises financial institutions on safety and soundness safeguards, governance, affiliations with non-financial entities, supervision and enforcement. He represents sellers and purchasers in mergers and acquisitions of business entities and assets, with targets including banking and financial institutions, retail, utilities and hospitality services.

Polibio has been resident in the Santo Domingo and Houston offices of Squire Sanders and has served as an intern in the legal department of the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) in Washington DC.

He is a member of the American Bar Association, Enlaces (an angel investors network), New York State Bar Association, Dominican Bar Association, National Association of Young Businessmen (Asociación Nacional de Jóvenes Empresarios) and Willem C. Vis Moot Alumni Association.

Representative Experience

• Representing a major Latin America-based bank in obtaining the governmental approvals and setting the operational structure to operate as a full commercial bank in the Dominican Republic.
• Assisting power generation companies in the sale and leaseback of a 100MW power plant located in the Dominican Republic, and in financing the construction of a port, natural gas storage tanks, gas pipelines and power generators through project finance.
• Representing a US-based underwriter in the proposed solicitation and consent to purchase of US$250 million of senior secured notes of a large-scale, high-end tourist project in the Dominican Republic, leading to an increased issuance of up to US$800 million of such notes under Rule 144-A.
• Assisting a major Caribbean-based bank in acquiring control of a local bank in distress and intervened on by the Central Bank of the Dominican Republic. We conducted legal due diligence on the corporate and operational structure and reorganized the structure and its loan practices.
• Assisting a multinational company providing water and wastewater services in several countries in conducting significant due diligence on its businesses in Panamá and Chile in the context of a stock purchase agreement.
• Representing the Central Bank and the Superintendency of Banks of the Dominican Republic in conducting due diligence and preparing a report on the loans and facilities extended to related parties of a major bank in the Dominican Republic that collapsed due to massive fraud undertaken by its senior officers and advisers, with estimated losses of US$2.2 billion.