As an attorney in private practice, he represented lenders, investors, and companies in project financing, mergers and acquisitions, venture capital investments, and structured finance transactions. In 2009 he joined the legal department of the Overseas Private Investment Corporation, predecessor agency to the US International Development Finance Corporation, supporting the agency’s mission of financing international development projects and providing political risk insurance to US investors abroad. He ultimately was appointed as the associate general counsel, project finance, where he was responsible for supervising line attorneys and supporting commercial officers in their financing and management of a multibillion dollar portfolio of large-scale infrastructure development projects.
In 2018, Paist moved to Casablanca, Morocco, to serve as principal legal counsel for Africa50, an investment fund platform established to help bridge gaps in funding infrastructure development on the African continent. In that role, he supported Africa50’s efforts to identify, develop, and finance key projects throughout the continent via its development fund and to make strategic equity investments in infrastructure via its finance fund. He also helped implement key investment, governance, and risk policies for the fund group before returning to the United States in late 2023.
