BPOP Popular Inc

Popular, Inc. to Present at Cohen Bros. & Co., Inc. 1st Annual Investors Conference SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico, March 17 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Popular, Inc. (NASDAQ:BPOP) announced today that Richard Barrios, Senior Vice President and Corporate Treasurer, will present at the Cohen Bros. & Co., Inc. 1st Annual Investors Conference at The Mandarin Oriental Hotel in New York City from 2:50 to 3:20 p.m. (EST) on Friday, March 18, 2005. If you are interested in attending the conference, please contact Erik Schneiman at 215-861-7825 or John Heppe at 215-861-7725. A live webcast of the conference will be available at http://www.bancopopular.com/ , beginning at 2:50 p.m. (EST), and a replay of the conference will be available at this link until April 19, 2005. Popular, Inc. is a full-service financial services provider with operations in Puerto Rico, the United States, the Caribbean and Latin America. As the leading financial institution in Puerto Rico, the Corporation offers retail and commercial banking services through its banking subsidiary, Banco Popular, as well as investment banking, auto and equipment leasing and financing, mortgage loans, consumer lending, insurance and transaction processing through specialized subsidiaries. In the United States, the Corporation has established the largest Hispanic-owned financial services franchise, providing complete financial solutions to all the communities it serves. The Corporation's finance subsidiary in the United States, Popular Financial Holdings, operates nearly 200 retail lending locations offering mortgage and personal loans, and also maintains a substantial wholesale broker network, a warehouse lending division, and an asset acquisitions unit. The Corporation continues to use its expertise in technology and electronic banking as a competitive advantage in its Caribbean and Latin America expansion, and is exporting its 111 years of experience through the region. Popular, Inc. has always been committed to meeting the needs of retail and business clients through innovation, and to fostering growth in the communities it serves. Popular is ranked among FORTUNE magazine's 2005 100 Best Companies to Work For. Cohen Bros. & Company, founded in 1999, is a boutique investment bank and institutional research house specializing in the financial services industry. Our award-winning research analysts focus on small and mid-cap ideas in the bank, thrift, insurance, and specialty finance sectors. Our methodology of finding value-oriented investment ideas that are not heavily followed by the Wall Street community has proven to be successful for many of our institutional and individual clients. An electronic version of this release can be found at the Corporation website, http://www.popularinc.com/ . Contact: Investor Relations: Media Relations: Jorge A. Junquera Teruca Rullan Chief Financial Officer Senior Vice President Senior Executive Vice President Global Communications 787-754-1685 787-281-5170 or 917-679-3596/mobile http://www.bancopopular.com/DATASOURCE: Popular Inc. CONTACT: Investor Relations, Jorge A. Junquera, Chief Financial Officer and Senior Executive Vice President, +1-787-754-1685, or Media Relations, Teruca Rullan, Senior Vice President, Global Communications, +1-787-281-5170, or mobile, +1-917-679-3596, both of Popular Inc. Web site: http://www.popularinc.com/

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