Raymond R. Savino, chief financial officer for the New York State Urban Development Corp., will soon resign from the state agency to take a job with the public finance department at First Boston Corp., the firm said yesterday.
Savino said he will join First Boston on Oct. 1 as a vice president working mainly on infrastructure deals in the northeastern United States. Savino has worked at the state agency for more than 10 years, starting as a financial analyst. He became chief financial officer in 1987.
According to state ethics rules, Savino will be barred for two years from seeking new bond business related to the Urban Development Corp.
Savino said that, under the ethics rules, he is also "barred for life" from working with the Urban Development Corp. on bond deals in which he was involved while at the corporation, such as refundings of previously issued debt.
Frank Farley, a managing director at First Boston, said the firm had hired Savino based on his knowledge of the public finance needs of the market's major issuers. Savino "has a real facility to deliver sophisticated products and lower interest costs for issuers," Farley said.
Other firms had approached him in the past for public finance jobs, Savino said, but First Boston had impressed him as a firm that "looked at public finance from an issuer's perspective."
Savino also said money was a motivating factor in his decision to jump from the public sector to a lucrative career on Wall Street. "Frankly, money is always part of the equation," he said.
