Francisco Gil Diaz

Francisco Gil Díaz (Mexico City, September 2, 1943) is a Mexican economist, who served as deputy governor of the Bank of Mexico during the first Governing Board after the constitutional reform of 1993; and as Secretary of Finance and Public Credit of Mexico during the administration of Vicente Fox Quesada.

He currently serves as executive president for Telefónica in Mexico and Central America. He has served as Chairman of the Board of Grupo Avanzia since September 2014. Chairman of the Board of Directors of Grupo Avanzia.

Education

He has a degree in Economics from the Autonomous Technological Institute of Mexico (ITAM), he also has postgraduate studies at the University of Chicago, and joined the Institutional Revolutionary Party in 1979. During his time as a university student at ITESM and ITAM, founded AIESEC in these universities.

Professional career

He has held different positions, both in the private sector and in the financial sphere of the Mexican government. Identified as a member of the group of technocrats related to President Carlos Salinas de Gortari^{[citation required]}, during his government he was Undersecretary of Revenue for the Ministry of Finance, occupying the ownership of said secretariat Pedro Aspe Armella. Later he was deputy governor of the Bank of Mexico (1994-1997) and member of the Board of Directors of Banamex-Accival, the last position he held in the private initiative was that of general director of Avantel. President Vicente Fox Quesada appointed him on December 1, 2000, Secretary of the Treasury, remaining in office until the end of his government.

During his tenure at the Treasury, he was accused of corruption, by granting a private trust the discretionary management of the resources coming from the country's customs.

He is also accused of putting pressure on Pemex, the state oil company, and some Afores in the country, to grant contracts and multimillion-dollar loans to his son. His son, Gonzalo Gil White, created a company called Oro Negro that, despite having a share capital of only one thousand pesos, and being recently created. He received investments from Afore Sura and Banamex for 500 million dollars and multi-million dollar contracts from the oil company for leasing services for oil platforms. The company ran into financial problems when Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex), his only client, reduced the contracted payments and Gonzalo Gil was accused of coordinating, together with his father, the fraudulent administration of more than 750 million pesos of Black Gold.

After taking office in the Government, Francisco Gil was invited to be an Independent Director of the HSBC bank in Great Britain, which he resigned to join the role he currently performs at Telefónica. HSBC's offer sparked a controversy that led the Ministry of Public Administration to investigate the case, and later determined to file it for lack of evidence.