As Provident’s President, CEO, and Vice Chairman of the Board, Mr. Hicks is a member of the executive team that establishes the company’s strategy, culture and fulfillment of its charitable missions. Mr. Hicks also spearheads Provident’s public-private partnership financings, working with project partners and beneficiaries, financing partners, investors and rating agencies to ensure successful financial execution and an ongoing commitment to our partners for the life of our engagement. His role includes management of origination, analysis, and execution efforts for transactions and project relationships across a variety of asset classes. Chris works to foster relationships with state and local governments, public and private universities and healthcare systems, as well as development partners, allowing Provident to utilize its proven financing platform to further not only its non-profit missions, but the missions of each of these partners. Prior to joining Provident, Mr. Hicks spent 18 years in the Public Finance Department of Citigroup Global Markets Inc., departing in 2019as a Director in their Higher Education and Public Private Partnership Groups. During his time at Citi, Mr. Hicks worked with clients on over $25 Billion in financings.
Mr. Hicks holds a B.A. in Economics and Political Science from Wake Forest University. Outside of Provident, Mr. Hicks is also a member of the Board of Directors for Healing Transitions, a non-profit organization in Raleigh, NC, that provides recovery services and emergency shelter at no cost to homeless, uninsured, and underserved individuals struggling with addiction.
Lynne Funk is Senior Director, Strategy and Content, Live Media at The Bond Buyer. She leads and shapes The Bond Buyer’s six major events, serving as host, moderator, thought leader and brand ambassador. Lynne also is charged with creating innovative live media formats, including new conferences and virtual summits to help serve our municipal finance community. She also has been a moderator or speaker at various industry events, including the Bond Market Association, the NFMA, WPF and the CDFA. Lynne has nearly two decades of markets and policy experience in the public finance industry. Prior to her current role, she was most recently Executive Editor of The Bond Buyer. Previously, she was a director at Municipal Market Analytics, Inc., and a Manager and Policy Analyst for the Municipal Securities Division at the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association.
Dr. Morteza Farajian was appointed by President Trump in 2019 as the Executive Director of the Build America Bureau (Bureau) within the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT). Under his leadership, the Bureau has become a dynamic, entrepreneurial team that blends the functions of an accelerator and a financial institution. It not only offers flexible, tailored, and low-cost financing options for infrastructure projects but also strengthens the capacity of local agencies and governments to explore and implement innovative funding, financing, and delivery solutions. Dr. Farajian’s vision to empower local governments, expand into new asset classes such as airports and transit-oriented development, and proactively engage new clients has led to a loan pipeline exceeding $50 billion by the end of 2024 — 10 times the size of the pipeline in 2019 and nearly equal to the total loans closed in the previous 28 years combined. Before assuming his current role, Dr. Farajian served as Acting Deputy Secretary of Transportation and Director of the Public-Private Partnerships (P3) Office in Virginia. Over the course of seven years, he led the procurement, financing, and contract negotiations for multimodal transportation projects totaling $14 billion. His strategic reforms to enhance competition, unleash private sector’s innovation, improve stakeholder engagement, and increase accountability elevated Virginia’s P3 program to become the leading P3 program in the U.S., earning numerous national and international accolades. A true entrepreneur, Dr. Farajian co-founded a crowdfunding platform that allows local and small investors to participate in infrastructure projects, either as equity or subordinate debt investors. He has a proven ability to lead diverse teams and is highly skilled in structuring and negotiating P3 transactions, organizational transformation, conflict resolutions and consensus building, business development, and public policy. Dr. Farajian’s impactful career in innovative infrastructure delivery and P3s, as well as his role in shaping large-scale multimodal transportation projects, has earned him numerous accolades, including the Trailblazer of the Year award from ARTBA and the P3 Individual of the Year award from P3 Bulletin. Dr. Farajian holds a Ph.D. and M.Sc. in Project Management from the University of Maryland, along with a B.S. in Civil Engineering.
Ted Chapman is a managing director in Hilltop Securities’ Dallas office, specializing in credit strategies and hot topics in the municipal bond universe.
Before joining HilltopSecurities in 2021, Chapman spent more than 20 years as a credit analyst at S&P Global Ratings where he served as their subject matter expert and rating criteria author for water utility municipal bonds, as well part of the global team that developed S&P’s initial views on sustainable finance and ESG. Prior to S&P, he was El Paso (Tex.) Water Utilities’ first-ever budget officer.
He has published commentaries on a wide range of municipal market topics, including affordability, resilience, and climate risk management. He has been recognized as a “municipal all-star” Wall Street analyst by Smith’s Research and Gradings every year since 2016. Chapman is an active member of the NFMA, American Water Works Association – including a member of its Finance, Accounting, and Management Controls committee and its Climate Change committee – and the Water Environment Federation. In 2017 he was appointed by the EPA Administrator to serve on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Environmental Financial Advisory Board (EFAB), where he served through 2023.
Ted holds a BA in political science from the University of Arizona and an MPA from the University of Texas at El Paso.
Euriah Bennett is a Vice President of Municipal Finance for Fidelity Capital Markets, the institutional trading arm of Fidelity Investments that provides trading products and services to a wide array of clients and Fidelity businesses. Fidelity Investments is a leading provider of investment management, retirement planning, portfolio guidance, brokerage, benefits outsourcing, and other financial products and services to institutions, financial intermediaries, and individuals.
Every year the Municipal Finance team is involved with hundreds of separate tax-exempt bonds and note transactions totaling billions of dollars. The team seeks to provide market access to our retail investors and deliver market demand to municipal issuers for public financing initiatives.
Mr. Bennett joined Fidelity in 2014 to expand the coverage of municipal issuers in Texas, the Southeast and Midwest. His responsibilities have grown significantly, and he now helps lead the coverage and support of municipal issuers across a broader geographic footprint, including California and other western states. Additionally, he provides guidance on Fidelity Capital Markets’ initiatives to expand investor opportunities in primary market municipal bond offerings.
Mr. Bennett has over 25 years of public finance experience, having served public entities across the country as both an investment banker and commercial banker. He has expertise with senior managed, co-managed and privately placed transactions spanning every sector of the public finance market, including general infrastructure, healthcare, housing, transportation and higher education. In addition, he also has executed derivatives transactions as part of comprehensive financing strategies.
Mr. Bennett has a B.A. in economics from Stanford University and an MBA with a concentration in finance from Columbia Business School. He currently holds FINRA series 7, 52, 53, and 63 licenses.