Fernandez was born in Cuba in 1955. His father worked as a lawyer and his mother was a seamstress. The family moved to the United States in 1967, settling in Hudson County, New Jersey.[3]
Fernandez graduated magna cum laude with high honors from Dartmouth College, earning a Bachelor of Arts degree in history. He earned a Juris Doctor from the Columbia Law School, where he received the Charles Evans Hughes Prize and a Parker School Certificate of International Law with Honors. He served on the Board of Trustees of Dartmouth College from 2003 to 2009.[4]
Career
Fernandez was named one of the "World's Leading Lawyers" by Chambers Global for his M&A and corporate expertise, an "Expert" in International Financial Law Review's "Guide to the World's Leading Project Finance Lawyers", and one of the "World's Leading Privatization Lawyers" by Euromoney Publications. He is recognized as a leading Corporate Finance attorney in the Latin American market in the Chambers Global 2008 legal guide and a leading Latin America attorney in the Chambers U.S. 2008 legal guide. He was featured by Hispanic Business Magazine in its "100 Influentials List" for 2006 and 2007.
Fernandez served as the Assistant Secretary of State for Economic, Energy and Business Affairs from December 2009 to October 2013. He led the Bureau that is responsible for overseeing work on international trade and investment policy; international finance, development, and debt policy; economic sanctions and combating terrorist financing; international energy security policy; international telecommunications and transportation policies; and support for U.S. businesses and the private sector overseas.
He became a member of the board of directors of Iberdrola in 2015.[5] Following his departure from the Department of State in October 2013, Fernandez returned to the practice of law as a partner in the New York City office of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher.