After attending a Catholic school in Juticalpa, Lobo continued his studies at the San Francisco Institute of Tegucigalpa and then at the University of Miami in Coral Gables, Florida in the United States.

Lobo was the National Party of Honduras' candidate for 27 November 2005 presidential election; Mario Canahuati was his running mate.

[4] He also promised to encourage private investment to generate employment and to increase social benefits in a country where 70% of its 7 million citizens live in poverty.

[needs update] President Lobo dismantled Manuel Zelaya's social reforms in favour of a more liberal economic policy: derogation of Decree 18-2008, which gave land to peasants, suspension of the minimum wage, adoption of the Temporary Employment Law (which allows workers to be hired "by the hour", thus preventing their possible unionisation and access to social rights), reform of the status of teachers and partial privatisation of education, and a law on the concession of natural resources, which allows resources such as water to be auctioned off.

The Obama administration, however, praised Lobo for his attempts at reconciliation, which include forming a truth commission to investigate events surrounding the removal from office as well as appointing a human rights adviser and political opponents to his government.

[8] The project of the American economist Paul Romer, which consists of building "private cities" on parts of the national territory where almost all the regulations would be given to investors and not to the Honduran state, is accepted by the government of Porfirio Lobo.

In the event that a subsequent government wishes to revisit this project, a decree states: "The systems instituted in the REDs [special development regions] must be (...) approved by the National Congress with a qualified two-thirds majority", with the understanding that "this constitutional status may only be modified, interpreted or overturned by the same majority, after consultation by referendum of the population living in the RED".

According to the Mexican agency Consulta Mitofsky, Porfirio Lobo's popularity in 2012 was only 14%, which made him the second most unpopular leader in Latin America at the time, after Costa Rican then-President Laura Chinchilla.

[10] Porfirio Lobo's presidency has not brought an end to the country's problems of violence, where the homicide rate in 2013 remains the highest in the world.

According to the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), Honduras is the country on the continent where poverty and inequality are growing the most.