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MFA Network 2022 - Speakers

January 24, 2022 - January 26, 2022
Loews Miami Beach Hotel Miami Beach, FL
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Conference Speakers

Headshot of Lee Ainslie

Lee S. Ainslie, III

Managing Partner, Maverick Capital, Ltd.

Before founding Maverick in 1993, Mr. Ainslie was a Managing Director of Tiger Management.  Mr. Ainslie serves on the boards of the Robin Hood Foundation, the Partnership for New York City, the Economic Club of New York, the New York-Presbyterian Hospital, and the Episcopal High School in Alexandria, Virginia.  Mr. Ainslie received a B.S. in Systems Engineering from the University of Virginia (Westmoreland Davis Scholar and Thomas Pinckney Bryan Jr. Scholar) and an M.B.A. from the University of North Carolina (Beta Gamma Sigma).  Mr. Ainslie and his wife, Elizabeth, have two sons.

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Mark Attanasio

Director, Alternative Investments, General Motors Asset Management

Mark Attanasio is a Director at General Motors Asset Management (“GMAM”). He currently oversees a team responsible for managing an allocation to hedge funds across a number of GM related pension plans.  Mark has been a member of this program since its inception in 2001. His primary responsibilities include due diligence, risk management and portfolio construction. Additionally, Mark has managed GM’s Equity and Global Tactical Asset Allocation programs during his career and sits on a several internal committees that oversee GM’s pension assets.

Mark joined GMAM in 1999, where his initial responsibilities were in risk management until his transition into the Absolute Return Strategies Group. Prior to joining GMAM, Mark worked at Bankers Trust Company in their Investment Consulting and Risk Management Groups.

Mark received a BA in Economics and an MBA from Rutgers University. Mark is a Chartered Financial Analyst.

Will Bartlett

Will Bartlett

CEO, Parallax Volatility Advisers, LP

Will Bartlett is Parallax Volatility Advisers’ CEO.  Will has been involved with equity options since 1995 and has been with Parallax since 1996.  In his more than 25 years at Parallax, he has played an active role in transforming the firm from a small, floor-based equity options trading operation into a large participant in the global volatility market.  Prior to joining Parallax, Will worked on the floor of the Pacific Coast Exchange while earning his Bachelor’s degree in Economics from the University of California, Berkeley.  Will proudly serves on the Board of Trustees of The Hamlin School and San Francisco University High school and the Board of Governors of Boys & Girls Clubs of San Francisco.

Catherine Beard

Senior Vice President, Alternatives Consulting, Callan LLC
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Amy Bensted

Head of Preqin Pro, Preqin

Amy Bensted is head of Preqin Pro at Preqin, the leading source of intelligence on alternative assets. In her role as head of Preqin Pro, Ms. Bensted oversees Preqin’s strategy and product vision for Pro, Preqin’s platform which enables connection and better decision making for fund managers, institutional investors and others in the alternative assets world. Ms. Bensted is a regular contributor of articles and features in the financial press and her research has been featured in the Financial Times and the Wall Street Journal as well as in specialist hedge fund media.
Ms. Bensted graduated from Imperial College London in 2002 with a BSc. (Hons). She went on to gain an MSc, at the same institution the following year.

Leda Braga

Leda Braga

Chief Executive Officer, Systematica Investments

Leda acts as CEO of Systematica Investments, an institutional hedge fund manager with approximately $13.2 billion in assets under management and offices in London, Geneva, New York, Singapore, Shanghai and Jersey. Systematica was formed in January 2015 as a spin-off of BlueCrest Capital, where Leda was President and Head of Systematic Trading for 14 years since 2001. Prior to BlueCrest Leda was part of Cygnifi Derivatives Services (a J.P. Morgan spin-off). At Cygnifi she was part of the management team and was head of its Valuation Service. Prior to Cygnifi, Leda spent nearly seven years at J.P. Morgan as a Quantitative Analyst in the derivatives research team. Her past experience includes modelling of interest rate exotics, FX/interest rate hybrid instruments and equity derivatives. She holds a PhD in Engineering from Imperial College London, where she worked as a lecturer and led research projects for over three years prior to joining J.P. Morgan. In addition, Leda has served as an advisor to the board of the pension fund of the CERN in Geneva and on the advisory board of the London School of Economics’ Systemic Risk Centre. In 2019 she has joined the board of the SBAI – the Standards Board of Alternative Investments.

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Paul Britton

Chief Executive Officer, Capstone Investment Advisors, LLP

Paul Britton is Capstone’s Founder and Chief Executive Officer. Paul focuses on setting the firm’s strategy, developing our culture, attracting key talent and overseeing the execution of investment and business functions. Paul began his career with Saratoga Limited, trading options on the London International Financial Futures and Options Exchange (LIFFE), and co-founded Mako Global Derivatives in 1999. In 2001, Paul moved to New York to establish and manage Mako’s U.S. operations, the buyout of which he led to form Capstone in 2004. Paul is immensely proud of the progress made by the team at Capstone over the years, and by the strong relationships we have been fortunate to build with our investors.

Paul currently serves on the Boards of the US Soccer Foundation, The Tate America’s Foundation and Friends Seminary School in New York City.

Paul received a B.A. degree in European Business Finance from London Metropolitan University.

Jan-Paul Bruynes

Partner, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP

JP Bruynes works with a range of professionals in the private investment space, focusing on the formation and operation of quantitative investment managers and funds. He actively participates in structuring, negotiating and documenting fund formation, seed capital and other transactions. He also advises hedge fund managers, investment advisers, commodity trading advisors (CTAs), commodity pool operators (CPOs) and third-party marketers with regulatory compliance, including responses to SEC, CFTC, NFA and exchange audits and investigations.

JP advises clients with respect to a broad variety of investing activity, including:

  • Securities
  • Commodities
  • Futures contracts
  • Options
  • Swap transactions
  • Cryptocurrencies.

JP brings over 25 years of experience representing leading quantitative fund managers in a practice that, in multiple industry surveys, is consistently hailed as a leader. With a team of over 100 lawyers, the practice is distinguished by the resources that it dedicates to representing quantitative fund managers, the high-profile nature of its engagements and the number of industry-leading managers that it represents.

JP is involved in community, civic and charitable activities that include membership in the Alternative Investment Management Association (AIMA) Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) working group, the Managed Funds Association CTA/CPO forum and the Connecticut Hedge Fund Association. He is also a former member of the New York City Bar Association’s Committee on Futures and Derivatives Regulation and its CPO/CTA subcommittee.

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Pablo E. Calderini

President and Chief Investment Officer, Graham Capital

Pablo E. Calderini is the President and Chief Investment Officer of Graham Capital Management, L.P. (“GCM”), an alternative investment firm with approximately $17 billion in AUM as of August 1, 2021.  Mr. Calderini is responsible for the management and oversight of the discretionary and systematic trading businesses at GCM, among other things.  Mr. Calderini is also a member of the firm’s Executive, Investment, Risk and Compliance committees. He joined GCM in August 2010 and became an Associated Person and Principal of GCM effective August 13, 2010. Prior to joining GCM, Mr. Calderini worked at Deutsche Bank from June 1997 to July 2010 where he held positions of increasing responsibility, most recently the Global Head of Equity Proprietary Trading. Mr. Calderini commenced his career at Deutsche Bank as Global Head of Emerging Markets. During his tenure at Deutsche Bank, Mr. Calderini also helped manage several groups across the fixed income and equity platforms, including the Global Credit Derivatives Team. Mr. Calderini received a B.A. in Economics from Universidad Nacional de Rosario in 1987 and a Masters in Economics from Universidad del CEMA in 1989, each in Argentina.

TJ Carlson

TJ Carlson

Chief Investment Officer, Missouri State Employees' Retirement System

Eli Casden MFA

Eli Casdin

Chief Investment Officer and Founder, Casdin Capital, LLC

Eli Casdin founded Casdin Capital in 2011 and serves as Chief Investment Officer and Founder. Casdin Capital engages as productive investor-partners, helping to fuel the visions of industry leaders by adding expertise and experience to their funding. Focused on emergent technologies in Life Sciences for more than two decades, Mr. Casdin has been active in both private and public capital markets, following a passion for analyzing and investing in new technologies and business models within the Life Sciences and healthcare industry.

Prior to founding Casdin Capital, Mr. Casdin served as vice president at Alliance Bernstein’s thematic investment arm, focusing personally on new technologies for the life sciences and healthcare sectors. While there he authored the 2011 black book, “The Dawn of Molecular Medicine,” detailing the (then) early-yet-accelerating wave of innovations transforming healthcare and creating opportunity for investors from testing to targeted medicine, diagnostics to industrial agriculture.

Earlier, he worked as a financial analyst at Bear Stearns and Cooper Hill Partners, a healthcare-focused investment firm.

Mr. Casdin earned a B.S. from Columbia University and an MBA from Columbia Business School. Today, he serves as a director or an observer on various boards for a number of public and private life sciences companies, trade groups and academic institutes including Rockefeller University, the New York Genome Center Board and The Columbia University School of General Studies Board of Visitors.

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Adri Chaikin

Managing Director, Investments, New York Presbyterian Hospital
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James Chanos

President, Kynikos Associates

David K. Chene

Managing Partner, Kennedy Lewis Investment Management

David Chene co-founded Kennedy Lewis with Darren Richman in 2017. Mr. Chene is Co-Portfolio Manager of Kennedy Lewis and Co-Chairs the Firm’s Investment Committee and Executive Committee. Mr. Chene was formerly a Managing Director with CarVal Investors, responsible for managing the US Corporate Securities business based in Minneapolis, from 2012 to 2016. Prior to his role in the US, he was Co-Head of CarVal’s European Corporate Securities business based in London. In both roles, he focused on special situations and distressed investments, including the firm’s global liquidations exposures and European financial investments. Before joining CarVal, Mr. Chene worked at Credit Suisse in London, running the firm’s European Distressed business, and was responsible for risk management across the firm’s European Leveraged Finance trading activities, from 2010 to 2012. Prior to Credit Suisse, Mr. Chene was a Senior Distressed Trader for Morgan Stanley in London, from 2009 to 2010. Prior to Morgan Stanley, Mr. Chene was a Research Analyst at DiMaio Ahmad Capital from 2003 to 2009, first in New York and then later as Head of the Firm’s Asian Platform, based in Singapore. Mr. Chene began his career at CIBC World Markets as a Research Analyst in its Leveraged Finance Investment Banking Division in New York, from 2001 to 2003.

Mr. Chene actively supports charitable causes such as Ironman Foundation, Seeds of Peace, TreeHouse, Urban Ventures, WATCH, and Women for Women International. He is an Eagle Scout and an 8-time full distance Ironman finisher, including 2-times at the Ironman World Championships in Kona, Hawaii.

He received a BA in Business Economics and Accounting from the University of California at Los Angeles in 2001.

Allen Cheng

Associate Partner, ESG Investment Lead, Alternatives Research, Aon

Allen manages the New York office of the Hedge Fund Research Group and brings over 20 years of alternative investment experience. He is also the asset group head for ESG leading in policy design, investment manager rating implementation and consulting advice to firms requiring ESG solutions.

Before joining Aon Hewitt in 2014, he was Chief Investment Officer at Altegris Advisors where he managed the research group and was Co-Portfolio Manager of the firm’s alternative funds.  Allen was previously a Managing Director at Bank of America where he built and directed the hedge fund portfolio investment team and additionally oversaw numerous hedge fund products across diverse strategies. He has significant experience in the alternative investment industry, particularly in the areas of ESG, investment research and portfolio management across multiple investment strategies.

Allen earned his MBA from the University of Michigan and BA in Finance from the University of Maryland.  As a volunteer, Allen is an Investment Committee member for Rady Children’s Hospital in San Diego, CA.

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Andrew Collins

Director of ESG Investing, San Francisco Employees’ Retirement System (SFERS)

Andrew Collins joined the San Francisco Employees’ Retirement System (SFERS) as Director of ESG Investing in 2018. In this role, he leads responsible investing and corporate governance activities across the $30+ billion Plan. He joined SFERS from State Street Global Advisors where he was an ESG Investment Strategist. Prior to that he was Technical Director of Standards Setting at the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) where he was the lead author and key architect of SASB’s 77 industry standards. He has also held roles in environmental auditing and consulting, and he began his career as a corporate sustainability manager for the Indian conglomerate Mahindra & Mahindra. Andrew holds a BS from Yale University and is a Fundamentals of Sustainability Accounting (FSA) credential holder.

Giles Colwell

Head of Institutional Distribution - Americas, BlockFi

Giles Colwell is responsible for overseeing the Americas distribution team and delivering BlockFi’s crypto products and services to institutional clients. Giles has more than 30 years of experience on Wall Street, including positions at Bank of America, JPMorgan, and UBS. Throughout his career, he has held senior leadership roles across Global Markets and FIG banking, providing insight, advice, and tailored solutions to investment managers, corporations, and individuals. For the last decade, Mr. Colwell has been a Managing Director in the Senior Relationship Management team at Bank of America, responsible for overseeing the entire Bank of America platform and driving strategic dialogue with some of the bank’s largest institutional accounts across global markets, banking, capital markets, and advisory services.

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Christopher DeLong

Principal, Chief Investment Officer, Taconic Capital Advisors

Christopher Delong is Chief Investment Officer of Taconic’s Opportunity and Event-Driven Funds. Mr. DeLong joined Taconic in June 1999 as a Principal. Prior to joining Taconic, Mr. DeLong was a vice president at J.P. Morgan Securities in the Equity Derivatives Group where he spent almost three years on that group’s equity arbitrage desk. In addition, Mr. DeLong was an associate at Cravath, Swaine & Moore and Howard, Darby & Levin and served as a judicial clerk to the Honorable Ralph K. Winter of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. Mr. DeLong received an A.B. in European History, magna cum laude, from Harvard College, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa, and a J.D. from Yale Law School, where he was a Book Review Editor for the Yale Law Journal.

Lucas Detor

Lucas Detor

Managing Principal, CarVal Investors

Mr. Detor is a managing principal and member of the Investment Committee for CarVal Investors, responsible for leading the firm’s investment strategy and management. He also leads the firm’s transportation investments and oversees capital formation, emerging markets and real estate investments for the firm. Mr. Detor joined CarVal from Morgan Stanley, where he most recently served as managing director and co-head of the global distressed and U.S. leveraged loan business. Mr. Detor has also served the U.S. government as a Special Agent with the United States Secret Service, as well as serving in the U.S. Army Reserves and New York National Guard. Mr. Detor received his M.B.A. from NYU’s Stern School of Business and his B.S. in accounting from SUNY Albany and is a Certified Public Accountant (inactive).

CarVal Investors is a leading global alternative investment fund manager focused on distressed and credit-intensive assets and market inefficiencies. Since 1987, our experienced team has navigated through ever-changing credit market cycles, opportunistically investing $126 billion in 5,510 transactions across 82 countries. Today, CarVal Investors has approximately $10 billion in assets under management in both credit and real estate strategies.

Andreas Dische

Senior Investment Officer, Opportunistic & Credit Investments, New York State Common Retirement Fund

Andreas Dische is a Senior Investment Officer at the New York State Common Retirement Fund, responsible for opportunistic investments across public and private markets. The Fund is the third largest public pension plan in the nation with approximately $268 billion in assets. Andreas invests in private credit, special situations, hedge funds and GP Stakes. He is an advisory board member of several funds and oversees the plan’s multi-sector fixed income strategic partnership mandates.

Previously, Andreas was Head of Global Macro at OMERS, where he led a team of multi-asset investors and managed an absolute return portfolio across global equity, fixed income and currency markets. Earlier, he was Head of Global Tactical Asset Allocation Research at JP Morgan Asset Management and a Global Strategist at Goldman Sachs.

Andreas serves on the board of Capital Constellation and is a member of the American Council on Germany. He holds an MBA and a Ph.D. in finance from the University of St. Gallen in Switzerland. Andreas was a Swiss National Science Foundation Fellow and a Visiting Scholar at Harvard University.

Derek Drummond

Derek Drummond

Portfolio Manager-Funds Alpha, State of Wisconsin Investment Board
Anne-Marie Fink

Anne-Marie Fink

Chief Investment Officer, Private Markets and Funds Alpha, State of Wisconsin Investment Board

Anne-Marie Fink serves as the State of Wisconsin Investment Board’s Chief Investment Officer for Private Markets and Funds Alpha. At SWIB since 2020, she is responsible for overseeing more than $70 billion in assets in private equity, real estate, hedge funds, externally managed accounts, private debt, and venture capital portfolios, and a team of 38 professionals.
Anne-Marie has more than two decades of investment management experience. She served as the chief investment officer for the Employees’ Retirement System of Rhode Island and for a large family office. Anne-Marie started her investment career at JP Morgan, where she spent more than 16 years as an equity and hedge fund analyst. Before SWIB, she was at State Street Global Advisors as the portfolio strategist for alternative investments.

Anne-Marie earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Yale University and an MBA from Columbia Business School. She is also the author of The Money Makers: How Extraordinary Managers Win in a World Turned Upside Down, which draws on investors’ experience to identify best practices in business management across companies and industries.

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Marcus Frampton

Chief Investment Officer, Alaska Permanent Fund Corporation

Marcus Frampton, CFA, CAIA, FRM serves as the Chief Investment Officer of the Alaska Permanent Fund Corporation, where he manages a team of 25 investment professionals and is responsible for leading the firm’s investment activities.  Mr. Frampton has been with APFC since 2012 and served as the Director of Investments, Real Assets & Absolute Return before his promotion to CIO in 2018.

Prior to joining APFC, Marcus held diverse roles ranging from investment banking with Lehman Brothers, private equity investing with PCG Capital Partners, and as an executive with LPL Financial, a private equity backed portfolio company.

Mr. Frampton holds a BA in Business-Economics with a minor in Accounting from UCLA.  In addition to serving on the Board of Directors of Managed Funds Association, Marcus is also a Director of Scientific Industries, Inc. (OTC: SCND), a leading manufacturer of laboratory equipment and developer of intellectual property and products around bioprocessing; Nyrada, Inc., a privately-held drug development company; and Twin Creeks Timber, LLC, a privately-held owner/operator of institutional quality timberland assets.

Josh Friedman

Josh Friedman

Co-Founder, Co-Chairman and Co-Chief Executive Officer, Canyon Partners, LLC

Josh Friedman is Co-Founder, Co-Chairman and Co-Chief Executive Officer of Canyon Partners, LLC. Mr. Friedman is a graduate of Harvard College (B.A., summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, Physics), Oxford University (M.A., honors, Politics and Economics, Marshall Scholar), Harvard Business School (M.B.A., Baker Scholar) and Harvard Law School (J.D., Sears Prize, magna cum laude). Prior to forming Canyon, Mr. Friedman was Director of Capital Markets for High Yield and Private Placements at Drexel Burnham Lambert. Prior to working at Drexel, Mr. Friedman worked in the Mergers and Acquisitions Department of Goldman Sachs in New York.

In 2014, Mr. Friedman, along with Co-Founder Mitch Julis, received Institutional Investor’s “Lifetime Achievement” Award. Mr. Friedman is a member of the George W. Bush Presidential Center Executive Advisory Council. Additionally, Mr. Friedman serves on the boards and/or investment committees of a number of endowments and foundations including Harvard Management Company, Harvard Committee on University Resources, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, California Institute of Technology, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, The Broad Foundation, and Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA). Mr. Friedman previously served on the investment committee of the J. Paul Getty Trust and Board of the Dean’s Advisors for Harvard Business School, as well as the boards of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the UCLA Hospital Department of Neurosurgery, the UCLA Anderson School of Management, and the California Science Center.

Mr. Friedman and his wife, Beth, live in Dallas, Texas and have three sons. Mr. and Mrs. Friedman co-endowed the Star-Friedman Challenge for Promising Scientific Research at Harvard University and are 2019 recipients of the Ellis Island Medal of Honor.

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Sam Gallo

Chief Investment Officer, University System of Maryland Foundation, Inc.

As the Chief Investment Officer of the University System of Maryland Foundation, Sam is responsible for the investment of endowment and operating fund assets for the benefit of 22 higher education institutions within the State of Maryland.

Sam’s prior experience includes leadership roles with financial service provider PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), investment consulting firm Ennis Knupp & Associates, and as a portfolio manager/trader at Goldenberg Hehmeyer & Company.

Sam is a former board member of the Managed Funds Association (MFA) and its Center for Alternative Investment Education, the former investment committee chairman and board member of the Bender JCC of Greater Washington, founder and past president of the Charted Alternative Investment Analyst (CAIA) Association Washington D.C. Chapter, past board member of Bethesda, Maryland’s Suburban Hospital Foundation, and an advisory board member to several investment industry forums.

Sam earned a Masters in Business Administration with Honors from the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business and two Bachelor of Science degrees with High Honors in both Accounting and Finance from the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign.

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Tony Gannon

Founder & Chief Investment Officer, Abbey Capital

Tony Gannon is Founder and Chief Investment Officer of Abbey Capital Limited. As CIO, Tony guides and drives investment research at Abbey Capital. Tony is a Director of Abbey Capital and also Chair of the Investment Committee.

Tony founded Abbey Capital in 2000 with a vision to create an alternative investment business providing multi-manager funds specializing in the managed futures and foreign exchange sectors of the hedge fund industry. Over its twenty year history, Tony has overseen Abbey Capital’s growth from a start-up to a global company which is currently one of the largest independent allocators in the Commodity Trading Advisor (CTA) industry.

Prior to founding Abbey Capital, Tony was a co-founder of Allied Irish Capital Management (AICM), a Dublin-based CTA, in conjunction with Allied Irish Banks. He helped to grow AICM to become one of the largest European CTAs, with funds under management growing from an initial $50 million to in excess of $1.4 billion.

Tony has more than 30 years’ investment experience in the managed futures industry. He is globally recognized and acknowledged as a leader in the industry. He is a regular guest speaker at alternative investment industry conferences.

Tony graduated with a Bachelor of Commerce degree and a Masters in Business Studies with Finance from University College Dublin, Ireland.

 

Charles Gillanders

Digital Transformation, Technology and Blockchain Manager, U.S. Bank Global Fund Services
Charles Gillanders is a digital transformation, technology and blockchain lead at U.S. Bank Investment Services. He has over 20years of experience leading change programs to help firms develop new capabilities and deepen client relationships, which includes 10 years as co-founder and chief technology officer (CTO) developing award-winning technology solutions at Quintillion. Quintillion was an independent fund administration firm acquired by U.S. Bank in 2013. Prior to Quintillion, Charles served as the business information officer at PFPC International, part of PNC Bank.
 
Education and credentials
Charles graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in computing for business from the University of Northumbria in Newcastle, England.
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Justin Gmelich

Global Head of Markets, King Street

Justin Gmelich is a Member and Global Head of Markets at King Street. Mr. Gmelich serves on our Management Committee, Global Investment Committee, Real Estate Investment Committee and Risk Committee and has been a member since 2020. Prior to joining King Street in 2020, Justin retired from Goldman Sachs where he was Global Chief Operating Officer for Fixed Income, Currencies and Commodities. Justin spent more than 20 years at Goldman in a number of senior positions including Global Head of Credit and Mortgage Trading, and a member of their Management Committee, Firmwide Risk Committee and Securities Division ExecComm. From 2008-2015 he ran their mortgage business, including CMBS and real estate loans. Prior to Goldman Sachs, Justin was an Associate Trader at Chase and a Vice President at Salomon Brothers. Justin also serves as a board director at MarketAxess, the leading electronic trading firm as well as Chair of the Villanova University Board of Trustees. Mr. Gmelich holds a BS from Villanova University, MS from University of Southern California, and an MBA from Columbia University.

Jody Gunderson

Jody A. Gunderson

Managing Principal, AB CarVal

Ms. Gunderson is a managing principal and member of the Investment Committee for CarVal Investors, responsible for leading the firm’s investment strategy and management, as well as its global loan portfolios and real estate businesses. In addition, Ms. Gunderson manages investments in asset-backed securities globally, including residential mortgage-backed securities, commercial mortgage-backed securities and collateralized loan obligations. Prior to joining CarVal Investors in 1994, Ms. Gunderson was a manager in the financial services practice of PriceWaterhouseCoopers where she served investment fund, commercial banking and thrift clients. Ms. Gunderson earned her B.S. degree in Business from the University of Minnesota and is a Certified Public Accountant (inactive).

CarVal Investors is a leading global alternative investment fund manager focused on distressed and credit-intensive assets and market inefficiencies. Since 1987, our experienced team has navigated through ever-changing credit market cycles, opportunistically investing $100 billion in 5,300 transactions across 77 countries. Today, CarVal Investors has approximately $10 billion in assets under management in both credit and real estate strategies.

Michael Haigh

Global Head of Commodities Research, Societe Generale

Michael Haigh is Managing Director and Global Head of Commodities Research for Société Générale and is based in London. In 2021 the Société Générale Commodities Research team was voted by the industry as the best Cross-Commodity Research team in Energy Risk, a highly respected publication dedicated to risk management, trading and regulation for the global commodity markets. Immediately prior to running the Global Commodities Research team, Mr. Haigh was Global Head of Commodities Research at Standard Chartered Bank, based in Singapore. Prior to joining Standard Chartered Bank, Mr. Haigh held the positions of Managing Director at K2 Advisors LLC, a Global Hedge Fund of Funds where he focused on Commodity Research/Investing, and also Managing Director and US Head of Commodities Research and Strategy at Société Générale in NYC. He also spent several years as the Associate Chief Economist at the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). Mr. Haigh began his career in academia and held a position as a tenured Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Maryland, US. Mr. Haigh has taught graduate (MBA) and undergraduate derivative courses at several universities including NYU Stern School of Business, Johns Hopkins University and George Washington University and supervised numerous Ph.D. dissertations on the commodity and financial markets. He has published numerous scholarly research papers on the commodity and derivative markets in several leading journals, including the Journal of Finance, Journal of Business, Journal of Futures Markets and the Journal of Applied Econometrics. Mr. Haigh holds a PhD in Economics with a minor in statistics from North Carolina State University.

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Anders Hall

Vice Chancellor for Investments and Chief Investment Officer, Vanderbilt University

Anders W. Hall serves as Vanderbilt University’s vice chancellor for investments and chief investment officer.  He leads the Office of Investments, where he is responsible for managing the university’s $7 billion long-term investment pool, including the endowment.  Vanderbilt’s endowment serves as the financial underpinning for the university’s mission of teaching, cutting-edge research, and service.

Hall came to Vanderbilt in September 2013 from Duke University, where he worked for over a decade as head of public securities for DUMAC, the university’s investment management company.  He oversaw public investments for the Duke University endowment, pension plan, health system’s long-term assets, and the Duke family foundation.

Prior to that, Hall was an investment consultant with Hewitt Investment Group in Rowayton, Connecticut, and Atlanta, Georgia, where he advised approximately 20 institutional clients.  They included the New York Stock Exchange, Freddie Mac, and the University of Alabama System.

He also spent three years in the Prudential Advanced Management Development Program, a highly-selective leadership training program based in Newark, New Jersey.

Hall, a chartered financial analyst, double-majored in public policy studies and economics at Duke University, where he earned a bachelor of arts in 1993.  He earned an MBA from the New York University’s Stern School of Business, where he majored in finance and economics and graduated with high honors in 1999.

Hall serves on the boards of Big Brothers Big Sisters of Middle Tennessee, the Pi Kappa Phi Foundation, Rock the Street Wall Street, and The Healing Trust.  He previously served as a member of the governing board of Westminster Presbyterian Church and co-chaired the Annual Fund at University School of Nashville.

Hall lives in Nashville with his wife, Joanna, and their three children: Latham, Stewart, and Charlie.

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Jan Hatzius

Chief Economist and Head of Global Investment Research Division, Goldman Sachs & Co.

Jan is head of the Global Investment Research Division and the firm’s chief economist. He is a member of the Firmwide Client and Business Standards Committee. Previously, he was head of Global Economics and Markets Research. Jan joined Goldman Sachs in the Frankfurt office in 1997 and transferred to New York in 1999. He was named managing director in 2004 and partner in 2008. Prior to joining Goldman Sachs, Jan was a research officer at the London School of Economics. Jan is the No. 1 ranked global economist in the annual Institutional Investor Global Fixed-Income Research Team, a position he has held in the global or US category for the past decade. Jan is a member of the economic advisory panels of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago and the Congressional Budget Office. Jan earned a D.Phil. in Economics from Oxford University, as well as degrees from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the Kiel Institute for the World Economy

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Kenneth J. Heinz

President, HFR Inc.

Kenneth J. Heinz, CFA is the President of Hedge Fund Research, Inc. (HFR) and is a leading authority on the global hedge fund industry. Mr. Heinz manages HFR’s industry leading hedge fund index business, including the HFRI, HFRX, HFRL and HFRU Indices. Mr. Heinz has provided specialized consulting services to the industry’s most significant institutional investors globally and has worked directly with thousands of managers, including many of the industry’s most influential firms. He has also contributed authoritative research and commentary to some of the industry’s best-known conferences and organizations, having provided keynote presentations at or for the following: Cayman Islands Alternative Investment Summit, GAIM (Monaco), the SwissFunds Association (SFA), University of Chicago Booth School of Business, Alternative Investment Council of Switzerland (AIC), University of Chicago Center for Research and Security Prices (CRSP), Skybridge Conference (Las Vegas), Money Talks (China) and various CFA Society Events. He is also a highly sought-after source of expert commentary for leading media outlets Including the Fox Business News, Wall Street Journal (WSJ), Financial Times (FT), Dow Jones Newswires, CNBC (U.S., European, Asian), New York Times, London Times, the Guardian, CNN, Fortune, Time, Pensions & Investments, Barron’s, the Nikkei, Bloomberg and many more.
Mr. Heinz has a Master of Business Administration from University of Chicago Booth School of Business with a concentration in Econometrics and Statistics and is a Charter Financial Analyst (CFA). Mr. Heinz holds a Bachelor of Science from the University of Illinois, with a concentration in Finance, Business Finance, Investments and Financial Institutions. Mr. Heinz also has experience as a trading member of Chicago Mercantile Exchange, Chicago Board of Trade and Chicago Board of Options Exchange.

 

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Seema R. Hingorani

Managing Director, Morgan Stanley Investment Management; Founder and Chair, Girls Who Invest

Seema R. Hingorani is a Managing Director at Morgan Stanley Investment Management. As part of the senior leadership team, Seema is focused on strategic client relationships, investment talent development and diversity initiatives across the platform. She is also Senior Sponsor of Investment Management’s Diversity Council and a member of Morgan Stanley’s Diversity and Inclusion Senior Leaders Advisory Council. Seema joined Morgan Stanley in 2019 and has 26 years of investment experience.

Seema is also the Founder and Chair of Girls Who Invest, a non-profit organization dedicated to increasing the number of women in portfolio management and executive leadership in the asset management industry. Previously, Seema was the Founder and Chief Investment Officer of SevenStep Capital, an opportunistic investment platform focused on seeding women portfolio managers. Seema served until June 30, 2014 as Chief Investment Officer for the New York City Retirement Systems which had assets of $160 billion. Previous to this appointment, Seema was Interim Chief Investment Officer and before that Head of Public Equities & Hedge Funds for the pension funds. Under her leadership, the pension fund was named Hedge Fund Manager of the Year – Large Public Pension Plans by Institutional Investor. Prior to Seema’s four years of public sector experience, she served as Global Director of Fundamental Research at Pyramis Global Advisors; a Partner, Portfolio Manager and Senior Equity Analyst with hedge fund Andor Capital Management; a Partner and Senior Equity Analyst at hedge fund Pequot Capital Management; Co-founder of hedge fund Mirador Capital Management; and an Equity Analyst with T. Rowe Price.

Seema has worked with several organizations focused on issues concerning women and girls and is a prolific speaker on the topic of a more robust inclusion of women in the corporate sector. She was awarded in 2021 by France with the insignia of Chevalier of the National Order of the Legion of Honor. She was also recognized in 2021 by Barron’s as one of 100 most influential women in U.S. finance, honored as the 2019 Bloomberg 50 “Ones To Watch”, the 2016 Woman with Impact by the Connecticut Women’s Business Development Council, and Wall Street Women Entrepreneur of the Year in 2015 by Traders magazine. Seema served as a member of the National Finance Committee of Secretary Clinton’s 2016 Presidential Campaign. She is an active member of The Economic Club of New York and 100 Women in Finance. Seema earned a B.A. in psychology/philosophy from Yale College and an MBA in finance from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

John Holton, CAIA

Assistant Vice President – Alternatives, Wilshire Advisors, LLC

John Holton is an Assistant Vice President with Wilshire and a member of the Alternatives Manager Research team with an emphasis on Diversifying Strategies. John joined Wilshire in 2015 and currently has seven years of industry experience. He earned a BA in Economics from Pepperdine University in Malibu, California, and is a Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst®.

Dana Johns

Senior Portfolio Manager, Maryland State Retirement and Pension System

Ms. Johns joined the Maryland State Retirement and Pension System in June 2011 and is an experienced private markets investor, senior portfolio manager and leader in the U.S. public pension and broader institutional investor community. Ms. Johns has over 15 years of experience investing and managing a multi-billion global portfolio of institutional alternative investment assets. She has deep expertise in private equity and highly developed personal network with established top performing private equity fund managers and next generation managers. Ms. Johns has a demonstrated long-term track record for selecting and managing a strong performing private equity portfolio. She is committed to supporting discourse and initiatives focused on the thoughtful advancement of private markets investing and creating pathways to inclusion for underrepresented talent in private equity.

Ms. Johns is co-CEO of PEWIN (Private Equity Women’s Investor Network) and a member of ILPA’s Diversity & Inclusion Advisory Council, AIF Women’s Leadership Steering Committee and the SEO Alternative Investments Limited Partner Advisory Council. Industry recognition in 2021 included Institutional Investor’s Global List of Top 50 Women in Investment Management, Trusted Insight’s list of Top Public Pension Investors Directors, and PEWIN’s Member of the Year highlighting her work in transforming the private equity industry with a focus on diversity, equity and inclusion.

Ms. Johns has both a B.A. in Comparative Literature from Indiana University Bloomington and a B.S. in Computer Info Systems, magna cum laude from Stevenson University. She graduated from Loyola University Maryland with a Master’s in Finance, cum laude while working full time as an associate at Camden Private Capital, a private equity fund of funds.

Simon Judes

Simon Judes

Co-Chief Investment Officer, Winton Group

Simon is Co-Chief Investment Officer, with overall responsibility for investment and research. He is also a member of Winton’s executive management and investment committees.
Simon joined Winton in 2008 as a researcher focused on designing commodity trading systems. In subsequent years he led research into new macro and equities trading strategies and portfolio construction methods, before taking overall responsibility for futures strategies in 2016.
Simon has a first-class honours degree in physics and philosophy from Oxford University, and a PhD in physics from Columbia University, with a thesis on string theory and cosmology.

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Jason S. Kaplan

Partner, Schulte, Roth & Zabel

Jason S. Kaplan concentrates on corporate and securities matters for investment managers and alternative investment funds. Jason represents institutional and entrepreneurial investment managers, financial services firms and private investment funds in all aspects of their business. Jason’s practice focuses on advising managers of hedge, private equity and hybrid funds regarding the structure of their businesses and on day-to-day operational, securities, corporate and compliance issues; structuring and negotiating seed and strategic investments and relationships and joint ventures; and advising investment managers with respect to regulatory and compliance issues.

Jason was recognized on Business Insider’s “Ready To Launch” list, which identifies the 29 leading bankers, advisers and lawyers for hedge fund launches. Jason’s recent speaking engagements include discussing “ESG” at SRZ’s 30th Annual Private Investment Funds Seminar, “Direct Lending: Opportunities in Volatile Markets” at the HFM Billion Dollar Club Virtual Summit and “The ABCs of ESG” for an SRZ webinar. Jason is also a co-author of SRZ’s “Private Funds — Market Trends Report.” Jason earned his J.D. from Fordham University School of Law, where he was a member of the Fordham Law Review, and his B.S. from the University of Michigan.

Ryan Kelly

Principal and Lead Portfolio Manager, PGIM Fixed Income

Ryan Kelly, CFA, is a Principal and lead portfolio manager for PGIM Fixed Income’s Credit Opportunities strategy. Mr. Kelly is also a senior portfolio manager for PGIM Fixed Income’s U.S. High Yield Team. Prior to his current roles, Mr. Kelly was a senior credit analyst in the Credit Research Group covering a number of high yield sectors including automotive, finance, energy, technology, telecom and power. During his tenure at PGIM Fixed Income he participated in a number of restructurings and workouts. Prior to joining the Firm in 2002, Mr. Kelly was a senior credit analyst at Muzinich & Company and an investment banker at PNC Capital Markets where he worked on high yield, mergers and acquisition and private placement transactions. Mr. Kelly began his career in investment banking at Chase Securities, where he specialized in project finance and mergers & acquisitions for the global power sector. He received a BA in Economics from Michigan State University and holds the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation.

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Christian Kober

Senior Derivatives Strategist, Capula Investment Management

Christian Kober is a derivatives strategist at Capula Investment Management LLP having joined the firm in July 2019. In this role, Christian works closely with the firm’s investment, strategy and investor relations teams. Christian was previously the Head of European Equity Derivative Strategy in Barclays’ Pan European Equity Research in London from 2010 to 2019 where he was ranked #1 in the 2016 and 2017 Extel survey. Earlier in his career, Christian worked at Morgan Stanley as Lead Analyst for European Equity Derivative Strategy and in Quantitative Equity Prop Trading. Christian began his career at SG Securities in 2001 where he was an equity research analyst, covering the transportation sector.

Kristin Kramer

Managing Director, Head of US Capital Introduction, Goldman, Sachs & Co.

Kristin Kramer is head of the U.S. Capital Introduction Group in Prime Services at Goldman, Sachs & Co. She is also a member of the Global Markets Division Sustainable Solutions Council. Kristin joined Goldman Sachs in 2009 as an analyst and was named managing director in 2019.

Kristin graduated magna cum laude from Columbia University with a B.A. in History. She serves on the board of directors for the Yleana Leadership Foundation.

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Paul Kreiselmaier

Director, Hedge Funds, Verus Investments

Mr. Kreiselmaier has over 20 years of investment experience in various roles in both manager due diligence, portfolio management, and quantitative research. At Verus, he is primarily responsible for investment strategy, due diligence, portfolio construction recommendations and relationship building across the hedge fund universe.

Prior to joining Verus, he was a senior research analyst at Russell Investments where he was responsible for evaluating, recommending and monitoring hedge funds for inclusion in client portfolios. He began his career at Russell evaluating US large cap equity and Global Tactical Asset Allocation (GTAA) managers. He also worked at Mellon Capital Management where he was responsible for both research and portfolio management related roles focused on both equity and GTAA mandates.

Mr. Kreiselmaier graduated from Trinity University with a bachelor of arts (BA) degree in economics. He also holds a master’s degree in business administration (MBA) from the University of Texas at Austin. He is a CFA charter holder  (Chartered Financial Analyst) and a member of both the CFA Institute and the CFA Society of Seattle. Mr. Kreiselmaier is also a member of the Chicago Quantitative Alliance.

Steve Kurz, Head of Asset Management

Steve Kurz

Global Head of Asset Management, Galaxy Digital

Steve Kurz is Partner and Global Head of Asset Management at Galaxy. A member of Galaxy’s founding team, Steve launched and oversees its industry-leading asset management business. Before joining the firm, he Co-founded Outer Realm, an enterprise focused immersive software company (sold in 2022). Previously, he was a Principal and Head of Business Development at River Birch Capital, where he led global capital formation efforts. Prior to that, he was a Vice President at Fortress Investment Group, where he held strategy, product specialist, and capital formation roles in New York and Singapore. He started his career as a Capital Markets Analyst in the Fixed Income Division of Lehman Brothers. He holds a B.A. in Economics from Cornell University. He also serves as a Term Member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

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John Kushner

Head of Relationship Management, Hedge Fund Services, Northern Trust

John Kushner joined Northern Trust in 2011 and is a Senior Vice President and Head of Relationship Management, North America, at Northern Trust Hedge Fund Services (NTHFS). John is responsible for managing and driving client service delivery, advocating for the current and future needs of the Hedge Fund and Private Equity Manager community, and extending NT’s services and relationships across the alternatives industry. John has 15 years of industry experience across the asset servicing space and 13 years of middle office, operations and client service experience within NTHFS (formerly Omnium LLC, subsidiary of Citadel LLC).

Prior to joining Citadel LLC in 2007 where he supported Fundamental Credit, Risk Arbitrage and Global Equity strategies, John managed a middle office operations team at Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. responsible for transaction processing on behalf of $2.2T in global custody client assets.

John holds a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Pennsylvania, is a Chartered Financial Analyst and an active member of several industry organizations, including SIFMA, ISDA, MFA and SWIFT.

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Craig Lehner

Senior Portfolio Manager, New York State Common
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Bob Litterman

Chairman, Risk Committee, Founding Partner, Kepos Capital

Robert Litterman is a founding partner of Kepos Capital; a New York City based systematic global macro firm, and the Chairman of the Kepos Capital Risk Committee. Prior to joining Kepos Capital in 2010, Dr. Litterman enjoyed a 23-year career at Goldman Sachs & Co., where he served in research, risk management, investments and thought leadership roles. He oversaw the Quantitative Investment Strategies Group in the Asset Management division.

While at Goldman, Dr. Litterman also spent six years as one of three external advisors to Singapore’s Government Investment Corporation (GIC). Dr. Litterman was named a partner of Goldman Sachs in 1994 and became head of the firm-wide risk function; prior to that role, he was co-head of the Fixed Income Research and Model Development Group with Fischer Black. During his tenure at Goldman, Dr. Litterman researched and published a number of ground breaking papers in asset allocation and risk management. He is the co-developer of the Black-Litterman Global Asset Allocation Model, a key tool in investment management, and has co-authored books including The Practice of Risk Management and Modern Investment Management: An Equilibrium Approach (Wiley & Co.).

Dr. Litterman earned a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Minnesota and a B.S. in Human Biology from Stanford University. He was inducted into Risk Magazine’s Risk Management Hall of Fame and named the 2013 Risk Manager of the Year by the Global Association of Risk Professionals. In 2012, he was the inaugural recipient of the S. Donald Sussman Fellowship at MIT’s Sloan School of Management. In 2008, Mr. Litterman received the Nicholas Molodovsky Award from the CFA Institute Board as well as the International Association of Financial Engineers/SunGard Financial Engineer of the Year Award. Mr. Litterman serves on a number of boards, including Commonfund, where he was elected Chair in 2014, the Niskanen Center, Resources for the Future, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Ceres, World Wildlife Fund, the Sloan Foundation, the Woodwell Climate Research Center, and the Climate Leadership Council, where he serves as co-chair of the Board.  Dr. Litterman also chaired the CFTC Climate-Related Market Risk Subcommittee, which published its report, “Managing Climate Risk in the U.S. Financial System,” in September 2020.

Christine Lowney

Partner, Ernst & Young LLP

Christine Lowney is a Partner in the assurance practice of EY with over 23 years of experience serving clients within the financial services industry, including investment advisors, hedge funds, private equity funds, investment banks and broker-dealers. Christine is currently located in New York but is in the process of relocating to South Florida where she will lead the Wealth & Asset Management assurance practice for EY’s South region.

In her role as an assurance partner, Christine advises clients on complex accounting and valuation issues, regulatory matters, restructurings, acquisitions, public offerings and securitization transactions.  She brings deep experience in both US GAAP and IFRS technical matters, including consolidation, revenue recognition, business combinations and fair value measurements.

Christine serves as the global client service partner on two large global investment advisors, each operating in more than 25 countries. She also leads the audits of several alternative investment funds, including the audit of a global fund complex with more than $50 billion in assets under management. She has deep technical experience with issues faced by alternative investment managers including valuation of private and illiquid investments, accounting for compensation/payouts, share based compensation, allocation of expenses and trade reporting.

Christine holds a B.S. in Accounting from Fordham University and M.B.A. from Columbia Business School. Christine is a certified public accountant licensed in New York and Rhode Island and is a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and New York State Society of CPAs. Christine serves on the finance committee of the EY Foundation, as an advisory board member of Fordham University’s Center for Professional Accounting Practices and as a board member of the New York City chapter of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.

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Shaun Martinak

Research/Portfolio Manager, One River Digital 

Edouard Matitia-Cohen

Global Head of Equity Financing Distribution, Bank of America

Edouard Matitia-Cohen is a Managing Director and Global Head of Equity Financing Distribution at Bank of America, based in New York.

In his role, he is responsible for all sales globally across Prime Financing, Equity Synthetics, Stock Loan, Capital Strategies and Business Consulting, ensuring the delivery of an integrated coverage and distribution strategy worldwide. He joined the firm in 2012 and was previously Americas Head of Equity Sales.

Prior to joining Bank of America, Matitia-Cohen was the European Head of Equity Derivatives, Convertibles and Delta One sales at Credit Suisse, based in London. He was a member of Credit Suisse’s European Equity Management Committee and Global Equity Management Committee.

Previously, Matitia-Cohen worked at Morgan Stanley for over 11 years and held various roles including the Head of U.S. Capital Structure and Special Situations business in New York, and a member of the Equity Derivatives trading team in London.
He holds a B.A. (Hons.) in economics from ICADE University in Madrid and Ecole Superieure de Commerce in Reims, France.

Matitia-Cohen serves on a variety of boards in multiple capacities across leading organization in several fields. He is a term corporate member of the Council of Foreign Relations (CFR), Executive Advisory Board member of the Hispanic Latino Advancement Org., Board member of the Managed Fund Association (MFA), and an outside advisor to the Board at the ISW, The Institute for the Study of War in Washington, D.C.

R. Brent Mattis, CFA, CAIA

Principal, Cleveland Clinic Investment Office

R Brent Mattis, CFA, CAIA is a Principal at the Cleveland Clinic Investment Office.  His responsibilities include alternatives due diligence and research on novel asset types. Prior to joining the Cleveland Clinic, he was Senior Analyst at the Rainin Group, a New York City-based single family office where he spent six years sourcing, underwriting, and executing investments in alternative asset managers, private direct investments, and individual public equities. In 2011, he discovered crypto and bitcoin mining. He began his career as a Research Associate in the drug discovery group of Rigel Pharmaceutical. He is a CFA and CAIA Charterholder, received an MBA with Distinction from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth and a BS in Chemistry from UC-Berkeley.

Sean McChesney

Sean McChesney

Vice President Diversifying Strategies, Fund Evaluation Group
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Sean McGould

President, Co-Chief Investment Officer, Lighthouse Investment Partners LLC

Jamie McGurk

General Partner, BAM Elevate, Balyasny Asset Management L.P.

Jamie McGurk is a General Partner on the BAM Elevate team, working in our San Francisco office. With over 20 years of experience, he joined BAM in April 2021 from Coatue Management, where he was a Managing Partner covering Private Investments.  Prior to Coatue, Jamie was an Operating Partner at Andreessen Horowitz for almost 8 years.  He has also held leadership and investment banking roles advising technology companies on strategy, M&A and capital markets, most recently with Thomas Weisel Partners, and began his career with Morgan Stanley.  Jamie holds a Master of Business Administration from Georgetown University, as well as a Bachelor of Science in Finance from Marist College.

Michael Megaw

Managing Director – Regulatory, Analytics, Data, & Risk, SS&C Technologies, Inc.

Michael Megaw founded the Regulatory, Analytics, Data, & Risk group at SS&C. He has worked at SS&C since 2005 and is a member of the Global SS&C Operating committee. Michael has grown the business to over 30 products and services, over 1,000 employees, and over 1,200 clients worldwide. Prior to the group’s founding, Michael helped manage the SS&C GlobeOp business, helping to establish it as one of the top three fund administrators in the world. Michael earned an MBA from NYU Stern and a B.A. in Accounting and Finance from Franklin and Marshall College.

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Keith Meister

Founder and Chief Investment Officer, Corvex Management LP

Keith Meister currently serves on the board of directors for MGM Resorts, BetMGM, and several special purpose acquisition companies sponsored by CMLS Holdings, LLC. He has previously served as a director on numerous other public boards including: Yum! Brands, Inc., The Williams Companies, The ADT Corporation, Ralcorp Holdings, and Motorola, Inc./Motorola Mobility, Inc., among others. He is also Chairman of the board of directors for Harlem Children’s Zone and a member of the board of trustees for the American Museum of Natural History.

Amos Meron

Managing Partner & Chief Investment Officer, Empyrean Capital Partners LP

Amos Meron co-founded Empyrean Capital Partners in 2004. Mr. Meron has extensive experience spanning over a 30-year investment management career overseeing a wide variety of investments in the special situations strategy. Prior to founding Empyrean, Mr. Meron was a Partner at Goldman, Sachs & Co., where he was a member of the Arbitrage and Proprietary Equity Strategies Departments. In 1996, Mr. Meron was promoted to co-head of the U.S. group, and in 1997 to sole head. Beginning in late 2000, Mr. Meron founded and headed a new business initiative for the Equities Division focused on proprietary trading opportunities in the Technology and Telecom sectors. From 1989 to 1991, Mr. Meron was a

member of Goldman Sachs’ Principal Investment Area (the firm’s private equity arm). Mr. Meron served on Goldman Sachs’ firm-wide Senior Trader Committee, the Technology Operating Committee, and as a member of the Advisory Board for Goldman Sachs Private Equity Partners (a multi-billion dollar fund-of-funds). Mr. Meron earned an A.B. in Economics from Harvard College, graduating summa cum laude in 1989.

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Louis Molinari

Managing Director, Barclays

Mr. Molinari is a Managing Director and a member of the Prime Services senior management team at Barclays, based in New York.

Mr. Molinari joined Barclays in September 2008 from Lehman Brothers, where he was a Managing Director and US Head of the Capital Introductions.  Prior to joining Lehman Brothers he was a founding partner and President of Metropolitan West Securities LLC, a US Investment Advisor and Broker Dealer firm.  Under his leadership Metropolitan West accumulated over $400bn in assets under custody across 50+ account relationships globally.  Mr. Molinari was a member of Metropolitan West’s executive, credit and investment committees.  He began his career at Merrill Lynch, working in various roles throughout the firm and ultimately serving as Managing Director of their Institutional Asset Management businesses.

Mr. Molinari has a JD from Fordham University School of Law and a BS in Business Administration from Fordham University.  Mr. Molinari is a member of the New York State Bar.

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Katherine Molnar

Chief Investment Officer, Fairfax County Police Officers Retirement System

Ms. Molnar joined Fairfax County Retirement Systems in 2013 and currently serves as Chief Investment Officer of the Fairfax County Police Officers Retirement System, a $1.8 billion plan. Her responsibilities include all aspects of portfolio management and oversight, including strategic and tactical asset and risk allocation, selection and supervision of external investment managers and risk management. From 2001 until 2012, Ms. Molnar was Vice President, Senior Research Analyst at AIG Investments’ Hedge Fund Solutions Group – both in London and New York. At AIG Investments, Ms. Molnar was responsible for due diligence procedures and research including: sourcing new managers, monitoring current hedge funds, analyzing portfolio risk and performance, making new investment recommendations to an investment committee as well as hedge fund asset allocation recommendations for portfolio construction. She was additionally responsible for portfolio reviews and overall asset allocation recommendations for external client portfolios. Previously, she was Vice President, Market Research Analyst at Citigroup Investments’ Alternative Investment Strategies group. Prior investment management experience includes positions at Paribas Asset Management as well as Trevor Stewart Burton & Jacobsen. Additionally, Ms. Molnar spent one year in Warsaw, Poland launching the first retail mutual funds available to the Polish market as well as two years in Frankfurt, Germany as an intern with J.P. Morgan. Ms. Molnar received a B.S. in Business Administration/Finance from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She is a CFA charterholder.

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Brian Neale

Vice President of Investments, Nebraska Foundation

Mr. Neale has over two decades of institutional investment experience and is responsible for the oversight and investment of more than $2.8B of investable assets on behalf of the University of Nebraska Foundation.  In this role, his principal duties include establishing long-term asset allocation policies and short-term tactical tilts, manager research and selection, portfolio compliance and oversight, and serving as principal staff liaison to the Foundations Investment Committee.  Additionally, Mr. Neale is part of the Foundations Executive Leadership Team.  Mr. Neale has been with the Foundation since 2014, having joined most recently from MedStar Health (Baltimore, MD), and Wells Fargo Securities (Richmond, VA) prior to that.  He Holds a Bachelors of Arts degree in History from the Virginia Military Institute and an MBA from The College of William & Mary.  Proud to call himself a Midwesterner, he resides in Lincoln with his wife and two children.

Penny Novick

Managing Director, Global Co-Head of Prime Brokerage, Morgan Stanley

Penny Novick is a Managing Director at Morgan Stanley within the Institutional Equity Division as the Global Co-Head of Prime Brokerage and is a senior member of the management team serving within the Equity Operating Committee. Prior to this role, Penny served as the Global Head of Futures and Derivatives Clearing and prior to that the Global Chief Operating Officer for Prime Brokerage, including responsibility for managing the Global Business CFO and business finance team functions, the global client coverage organization, operating infrastructure and the technology and product development agendas. She has been with the Firm since 2000, starting as a Vice President and then Executive Director in the Business Improvement Group and subsequently as an Executive Director in the Multi-Asset Class team in Prime Brokerage. She is based in New York.

Penny also serves on a number of internal and external committees including, Chair of Morgan Stanley’s Women’s Business Alliance, IED Co-Captain of Recruiting for Cornell University as well as is a member of both the IED and ISG Diversity Councils. Additionally, she is a member of Cornell University’s Charles H. Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management Advisory Council and Co-Chairs the DEI Sub-committee, a member of the President’s Council of Cornell Women (PCCW) as well as was appointed to the Cornell Leadership Council on Combating Racism and Promoting Diversity, Inclusion, Equity and Belonging in August 2020.

Prior to joining Morgan Stanley, Penny was at PriceWaterhouseCoopers where she was a Principal Consultant in the Risk Management Consulting practice having transferred from the Capital Markets Audit practice.

Penny holds a BS from Cornell University, graduating With Distinction and an MBA from NYU Stern School of Business. She also holds a CPA license with the State of New York.

Ric Ochman, CFA

Head of Quant Capital Introduction, JP Morgan

Ric Ochman, CFA is an Executive Director in the J.P. Morgan Capital Advisory Group.  Prior to joining J.P. Morgan Ric was the Global Head of Hedge Funds for AIG Investments. Before that Ric was a research analyst at Adair Capital. Ric started his career as a quantitative research analyst at State Street Global Advisors. Ric has an MBA from New York University and a BSBA from Boston University. He lives in New York City.

Kevin O’Connell

ESG Trust Solutions Practice and Global Asset & Wealth Management ESG Leader, PwC

Kevin is a partner and leads PwC’s ESG Trust Solutions Practice. He also serves as PwC’s Global Asset and Wealth Management (AWM) Sector ESG Leader. In both roles at PwC, Kevin works with clients to implement strategies to improve their ESG reporting and communicate progress to their investors and other stakeholders. He advises clients as they lead with purpose and articulate their story and value to society. Kevin brings extensive experience in delivering ESG reporting strategy, materiality assessments, risk assessment, information governance and data quality, measurement, reporting and assurance services. He has more than 25+ years of internal controls reporting, risk management, and compliance experience serving large multinational financial services companies.

Lynn O’Connell, CAIA

Senior Portfolio Advisor, Aksia 

As a Senior Portfolio Advisor, Lynn is part of the Portfolio Advisory team in North America responsible for private credit and hedge fund programs, including portfolio construction, risk management and manager evaluation. She focuses on portfolio analysis and implementation, manager sourcing and selection, investment and due diligence processes, as well as governance management and reporting. Lynn also works on business development efforts and marketing initiatives within North America.

Prior to her current role, Lynn was a Portfolio Advisor on the US Portfolio Advisory team. Before that she was a Senior Analyst on the Operational Due Diligence team focusing on assessing the operational, business, regulatory and fraud risks of alternative investment funds.

Prior to joining Aksia in 2012, Lynn was as an Operations Associate at CION Investments, an alternative investment manager, where she supported the investment, accounting, legal and technology departments.

Lynn graduated from Binghamton University with a BS in Financial Economics. She has earned the CAIA designation.

She is a member of 100 Women in Finance and was recognized as a Rising Star of Hedge Funds by Institutional Investor Magazine in 2017.

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Marcia Page

Founder and Chief Executive Officer, MPowered Capital, Co-Founder and Executive Chair, Värde Partners

Marcia Page is the founder of MPowered Capital, a firm established to invest in best-in-class female and other underrepresented talent in the alternative markets.  Through a rigorous research process, it became clear to Marcia that diverse managers represent a significant, untapped investment opportunity since they are undercapitalized and underrepresented even while generating higher returns compared to their non-diverse peers. Marcia believes now is the time to commit resources to diverse managers in a more structured and disciplined way and is committing substantial personal capital to fund exceptional investment talent.

Marcia also co-founded $14 billion global alternative investment management firm Värde Partners in 1993, serving as Co-CEO and Co-CIO until 2016.  Marcia led the firm’s investment strategy and business growth, including fundraising, talent and culture building, and global development.  Marcia currently serves as Chair of Värde’s Partner Committee and is a member of the firm’s Investment Committee.

Marcia holds a B.A. in Economics from Gustavus Adolphus College, and an M.B.A. from the University of Minnesota.  Marcia serves in Board positions for Gustavus Adolphus College and the Carlson School of Management.

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Andrew Palmer

Chief Investment Officer, Maryland State Retirement and Pension System

Andrew Palmer, CFA is the Chief Investment Officer for the Maryland State Retirement and Pension System. In this role, he is responsible for the day-to-day operations of the System’s investment division and has overall responsibility for the System’s investment program.

Previously he was the Deputy Chief Investment Officer, Director of Fixed Income for the Tennessee Consolidated Retirement System. In addition to his role as Director of Fixed Income, he led the construction of a Strategic Lending Portfolio, was a member of the Private Equity and Real Estate Committees and shared in the responsibility for tactical asset allocation and new product development. He began his career at ASB Capital Management, a Bethesda, Maryland based institutional advisory firm.

Mr. Palmer is a member of the University of Maryland, Economics Leadership Council, and the ILPA, has been active in the CFA program and was President of the Washington Association of Money Managers. He received a BA and an MA in Economics from the University of Maryland.

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Jonathan Pollock

Co-CEO and Co-CIO, Elliott Investment Management L.P.

Jonathan Pollock is an Equity Partner, Co-Chief Executive Officer, Co-Chief Investment Officer, Chief Trading Officer, and member of the Management, Risk, Valuation, Compliance and Operational Risk, Allocation, and Global Situational Investment Committees at Elliott Investment Management L.P. Mr. Pollock is responsible for global situational investing, global trading, and operations. Mr. Pollock joined Elliott in 1989 as an Analyst, later becoming a Senior Portfolio Manager. In 1995, he opened Elliott’s London office and for the next 14 years led the firm’s European and Asian businesses, opening additional offices in Asia. In 2009, Mr. Pollock returned to the U.S. to become Head of Global Situational Investing and was promoted to Co-Chief Investment Officer in 2011 and Co-Chief Executive Officer in 2015.

Prior to joining Elliott, Mr. Pollock was an Analyst at E.F. Hutton and, later, Greenleaf Partners. Mr. Pollock received a B.A. in Management, with a minor in English, from Curry College.

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David S. Richter

Managing Director, Investment Committee Chair, Absolute Return Strategies, GCM Grosvenor

Mr. Richter is Chair of the Absolute Return Strategies Investment Committee, Co-Head of Absolute Return Strategies Research and serves on the Global Investment Council and the ESG Committee. He is also a member of the Strategic Investments Investment Committee. Mr. Richter approves portfolio allocations prior to implementation and shares responsibility for the evaluation, selection and monitoring of absolute return investment strategies and investment managers. Prior to joining GCM Grosvenor, he was the Founder and Managing Partner of Waveland Capital Management, L.P., a U.S. long/short equity hedge fund affiliated with GCM Grosvenor. Previously, he was a Manager with KPMG Peat Marwick, and then a Vice President of JMB Realty Corporation in the Corporate Acquisitions Group. Mr. Richter graduated summa cum laude with his Bachelor of Science in Accountancy from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He is a Certified Public Accountant and received the national AICPA Elijah Watt Sells Award from the American Institute of CPAs for his scores on the Uniform CPA Examination.

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Alison Romano

Deputy Chief Investment Officer, State Board of Administration of Florida

Alison Romano currently serves as Deputy Chief Investment Officer at the Florida State Board of Administration (SBA).  In that role she provides strategic leadership and oversight of the SBA’s internal and external investment portfolios, collaborates with senior staff to identify and manage risk, and supports the development and implementation of investment policies and the strategic plan. Previously, Ms. Romano was Senior Investment Officer, Global Equity, responsible for directing the investment of over $85 billion in active and passive strategies across all regions of the globe.  She led the asset class team in the management of internal funds and the selection of external equity and currency strategies.  Preceding that role, she served as Senior Portfolio Manager within Global Equity, providing broad oversight of active managers and identifying new investment strategies. Prior to joining the SBA, Ms. Romano held various positions at Goldman, Sachs & Co., last as Vice President in Investment Banking.  In this role she advised healthcare companies on mergers and acquisitions, financings and strategic alternatives.  Ms. Romano graduated summa cum laude with a BSE in Bioengineering from the University of Pennsylvania and a BSEcon from The Wharton School.

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Jackie Rosner

Managing Director, PAAMCO Prisma

Jackie Rosner joined the firm in 2013 and is a Managing Director and a member of the Portfolio Management team, with a specific focus on global macro, relative value, managed futures, and quantitative strategies. Prior to joining, Mr. Rosner was a Managing Director, head of global macro and systematic trading strategies, and a member of the executive committee at Union Bancaire Privee Asset Management in New York. Prior to UBP, Mr. Rosner was a proprietary trader at BNP Paribas in New York. Mr. Rosner has also been a portfolio manager at both Archeus Capital Management and Millennium Partners, and was a founding member of a proprietary trading desk in the fixed income department of Chase Manhattan Bank/J.P. Morgan. Mr. Rosner began his career at Salomon Brothers (Citibank) where he held various positions of increasing responsibility primarily focused on quant, trading, and fixed income strategies. Mr. Rosner is on the advisory board for the MIT Sloan Department of Finance, volunteers as a master’s thesis supervisor at the Department of Mathematics at NYU Courant, and has guest lectured at Columbia University’s Department of Financial Engineering. Mr. Rosner holds a B.S. in Economics, a B.S. in Management Science, and an M.Sc in Management from the Sloan School of Management at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He also holds an M.Sc in Mathematical Finance from New York University and completed the following Charters: CFA, CAIA, CMT, and FRM.

Kevin Russell

Chief Investment Officer, O’Connor

As CIO and Global Head of O’Connor, Kevin leads the capital allocation process for the multi-strategy fund, manages the major investment teams and sets strategy for overall investment capabilities.

Kevin joined O’Connor in 2016 from Citigroup, where he spent his entire 24-year career prior.

He was Global Head of Equities Trading from 2012 to 2015, responsible for all risk and trading across equity, equity derivative and equity financing products globally.

From 2007 to 2011, in addition to his role as Head of Equities Trading Americas, Kevin was responsible for Citigroup’s proprietary business in the US.

In this position, he oversaw USD 6 billion of assets in fundamental long / short equity, quantitative equity, convertible securities, structured credit, credit relative value and event driven strategies.

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David Sancewich

Principal, Consultant, Meketa Investment Group

Mr. Sancewich is a consultant and has 19 years of industry experience.  Mr. Sancewich joined the firm in 2019 as part of the merger between Meketa and Pension Consulting Alliance (PCA). His consulting work included asset allocation, risk budgeting, investment policy and guideline development, portfolio and manager attribution analysis, asset class structural reviews, investment manager searches, and performance monitoring.  Mr. Sancewich is a member of the firm’s Marketable Securities Investment Committee and Marketing Committee.

Prior to joining PCA in 2004, Mr. Sancewich worked at Windermere Investment Consulting as an Analyst where he focused on performance measurement analysis, traditional manager research, and day‑to‑day support of client specific issues.  Prior to that, Mr. Sancewich worked as an Analyst for the Russell Investment Group where he evaluated various US equity products for Russell’s manager research group.  Mr. Sancewich also advised large institutional clients on manager selection as well as Russell’s multi‑manager funds business.  He also helped work on the structure of Russell’s equity, taxable, and alternative investment products.

Mr. Sancewich earned his Bachelor of Arts in Finance and Business Management as well as his Master of Business Administration from Washington State University.  Mr. Sancewich has been a speaker at multiple conferences including the State Association of County Retirement Systems (SACRS), National Conference on Public Employee Retirement Systems (NCPERS), and Institutional Investor.

David Scopelliti

Partner, Global Head of Private Credit, Mercer

David Scopelliti is a highly experienced leader and investor specializing in the alternative investments – Private Credit & Private Equity with a track record in direct, co-investment and fund investing. He is also a proponent of (“ESG”) principles. He is currently Global Head of Private Debt for Mercer Alternatives.  Prior, he was Chief Executive Officer of Alcentra Capital Corporation (Nasdaq: ABDC) an affiliate of Alcentra and BNYMellon. He focused on corporate renewal and direct debt & equity investments in the North America. Prior, he was a Principal at GarMark Partners, leading private debt & private equity transactions across US middle market businesses.

Prior to that, he was appointed by the Connecticut State Treasurer to turnaround and restructure the $37 billion pension plan’s private investment program. Under his leadership, the program generated above-market performance, improved governance and expanded its investment scope. He was also elected Vice Chairman of the Institutional Limited Partners Association, (“ILPA”).

Earlier in his career, Mr. Scopelliti led direct private debt and private equity co-investments at ING Capital with a focus on transportation, homeland security, defense & aerospace, consumer, and environmental services. He has served on multiple public and private company boards in the Financial Services, FinTech, Media and Transportation industries. He is a current member of the National Association of Corporate directors. Mr. Scopelliti earned his BBA in Finance and Accounting from Pace University’s Lubin School of Business.

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Tarik Serri

Senior Director, Hedge Funds & Alternative Investments, Trans-Canada Capital

Tarik Serri is Senior Director, Hedge Funds & Alternative Investments at Trans-Canada Capital Inc. (TCC), former Air Canada Pension Investments since 2011. He has cumulated over 17 years of investment experience having previously worked as an analyst and investment advisor at prior institutions. He is responsible for the ongoing management, selection, monitoring and research for TCC’s Global Alternative Investments Program investing in Hedge Funds, Private Debt, Private Equity, Real Estate, Infrastructure and Co-Investment portfolios. Tarik is a voting member of the External Management Investment Committee (EMIC) responsible for the selection & management of the firm’s external managers and asset allocation decisions as well as the assessment of illiquid/liquid co-investment opportunities. Tarik is also a member of the Quantitative Investment Committee responsible for generating investment ideas and monitoring of the firm’s portfolio of internal investment decisions. He serves as an Advisory Board member of multiple external funds across alternative asset classes.

Tarik holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from Concordia University and a Masters of Business Administration (MBA) from HEC University. He has also completed the Canadian Securities Course offered by the Canadian Securities Institute and is a CFA and CAIA charter holder. He is also a recipient of the NextGen CIO 2019 nomination by CIO Magazine.

Nathan Sheets

Nathan Sheets

Global Chief Economist, Citigroup

Nathan Sheets recently joined Citigroup as Global Chief Economist.  In that role, he helps lead the Firm’s team of economists around the world.  His own research focuses on global themes, with a particular emphasis on the position of the United States in the world economy.

Previously, Mr. Sheets worked at the Federal Reserve Board for 18 years in a variety of positions.  From September 2007 to August 2011, he served as Director of the Board’s Division of International Finance and one of three Economists to the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC).  He advised the Committee on macroeconomic and financial developments in foreign economies, as well as on the outlook for U.S. trade, the dollar, and global commodity prices.  He also played a key role in the design and implementation of the Fed’s swap line program with other central banks that was put in place during the financial crisis.  Mr. Sheets represented the Federal Reserve at many international meetings—including of the G-20, G-7, and OECD—and was a member of the Committee on the Global Financial System sponsored by the Bank for International Settlements.  From 2006-07, while on leave from the Board, he served as a Senior Advisor to the U.S. Executive Director at the International Monetary Fund.

Mr. Sheets has published research in the Journal of Money, Credit, and Banking, the Journal of International Money and Finance, the Journal of International Economics and the Review of International Economics.  He received his B.A. in economics in 1989 from Brigham Young University.  As a recipient of the National Science Foundation Fellowship, Mr. Sheets completed his Ph.D. studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1993.

Kirk Sims

Head of Emerging Manager Program, Teacher Retirement System of Texas (TRS)

Kirk Sims heads TRS’ Emerging Manager Program. Since being established in 2005, TRS has committed $3.7 billion to one of the largest programs of its kind. An additional $2 billion has been invested directly with EM Program graduates. Each graduate was selected as a result of consistent outperformance among a group of more than 160 EM managers. Recognizing the Program’s success, in early 2019, TRS rolled out a plan to invest another $3 billion over the next three to five years.

Sims joined the Teacher Retirement System of Texas on March 1, 2019. Before joining Texas Teachers, he was a Senior Investment Officer for the Teachers’ Retirement System of the State of Illinois. Sims had oversight and management responsibility of TRS’s Emerging Manager Program, a $750 million evergreen pool of capital designed to identify and invest in emerging investment managers across all asset classes.

Prior, Sims worked at Prudential Retirement where he was responsible for a manager of manager’s retirement platform as well as an open architecture investment platform.  He also has a background in asset management and has held various positions with both large and small asset managers.

Sims is a CFA charter holder and holds a Masters in Business Administration from the Columbia University Graduate School of Business.  He received a Bachelor of Business Administration from Howard University in Washington, DC.

Justin W. Slatky

Justin W. Slatky

Chief Investment Officer, Shenkman Capital Management, Inc.

Justin W. Slatky joined Shenkman Capital in 2011. He has ‌​​23​‌ years of investing experience in high yield and distressed securities. Prior to joining Shenkman Capital, Mr. Slatky was Co-Head and Managing Director of the Distressed Bond business in New York and London for Goldman Sachs. He was also a member of the Credit Investment Committee charged with reviewing proprietary investments within the Credit Department. Before joining the distressed bond business in 2002, Mr. Slatky was a telecom high yield analyst and a recipient of Institutional Investor’s Runner-Up award. He joined Goldman Sachs from Credit Suisse First Boston in 2000, where he worked as a high yield analyst as part of an II ranked telecom team. Mr. Slatky graduated magna cum laude with a BS in Economics (1998) and an MBA (1999) from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

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Dave Snyderman

Global Head of Alternative Credit & Fixed Income, Magnetar Capital

As Global Head of Alternative Credit & Fixed Income, Mr. Snyderman is in charge of Magnetar’s Alternative Credit & Fixed Income business. He also serves as Chairman of the Investment Committee and is a member of Magnetar’s Management Committee. He joined Magnetar in 2005 shortly after launch. Previously, Mr. Snyderman was the Head of Global Credit and a Senior Managing Director at Citadel Investment Group. During his nearly seven years with Citadel, Mr. Snyderman worked on the convertible bond desk, helped establish the credit trading desk and ultimately presided over the merger of these two groups. In addition, he served in a senior management role as a member of the Management, Portfolio Management and Investment/Risk Committees. Prior to joining Citadel, Mr. Snyderman focused on convertible securities, merger arbitrage and special situations portfolios at Koch Industries, Inc. During his five years with Koch, he worked in that firm’s Houston, Wichita and Switzerland offices. Mr. Snyderman started his career at Price Waterhouse. He is also a founding board member of the Magnetar Youth Investment Academy. Mr. Snyderman earned an AB in Economics from Washington University and completed the certified public accountant exam.

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Silvia Stanescu

Investment Director, GAM Investments

Dr Silvia Stanescu is an Investment Director and co-leads the GAM Systematic Cambridge team.  Silvia’s expertise spans various aspects of quantitative finance –from portfolio construction to strategy signal generation, risk management as well as strategy design. Silvia joined the firm in 2018 when her main focus was on the Core Macro strategy and the firm’s options strategies. Prior to joining GAM Systematic, Silvia was an Equity Derivatives Strategist at Deutsche Bank, working on systematic option trading and bespoke solutions for clients. She joined Deutsche Bank from the University of Kent, where she was a Lecturer in Finance. She holds a PhD in Finance from the ICMA Centre at the University of Reading and holds an MSc in Finance (ICMA Centre, Reading), a BSc in Business Economics (Reading) and a BSc in Banking and Finance (Bucharest Academy of Economic Studies).

Carl W. Stewart

Global Head of Platform Sales, HSBC

Carl Stewart is HSBC’s Global Head of Platform Sales, having previously been responsible for the Global Head of Hedge Funds where he was responsible for the business development and risk management of the activities with the firm’s hedge fund clients. Prior to HSBC, Carl served as the Chief Operating Officer of the European business of Och-Ziff Management Europe Limited, a US-based asset management firm. Before joining Och-Ziff he was the CEO and Managing Director of K2 Advisors Limited, the European arm of K2 Advisors funds-of-funds firm, and he also ran Zurich Capital Markets’ businesses in Europe and Asia. Mr. Stewart spent the first 14 years of his career with J.P.Morgan in a variety of roles in investment banking and capital markets, including as the co-Head of the Emerging Markets Derivatives business for Europe and Africa. Mr. Stewart has a BA in Economics from Harvard College and a Masters in Economics from the London School of Economics.

David Sultan

David Sultan

Chief Investment Officer, Fir Tree Partners

David Sultan is the Managing Partner and Chief Investment Officer of Fir Tree Partners, a value-oriented investment adviser founded in 1994.  The Firm capitalizes on mispriced opportunities across capital structures and asset classes, using a long-term and team-oriented approach.  Fir Tree manages assets on behalf of pension funds, endowments, foundations, families and other institutional investors.  Mr. Sultan joined Fir Tree in 1999 and assumed the CIO role in 2015.  Over his 22 year tenure at the Firm, Mr. Sultan has developed the Firm’s investment processes, culture and team.  Mr. Sultan has led the Firm’s corporate and sovereign credit, capital structure arbitrage, distressed, special situation equity and SPAC investments globally and through multiple market cycles.

Earlier in his career, Mr. Sultan was an investment banker at Wolfensohn and Co. and an analyst at fundamental value investment firm Siegler, Collery & Co.

Mr. Sultan holds a B.A. in Economics from Harvard University.

 

Steven A. Tananbaum

Founding Partner & Chief Investment Officer, GoldenTree Asset Management

Steven Tananbaum is Founder, Managing Partner and Chief Investment Officer of GoldenTree Asset Management, overseeing the firm’s investments across all fund offerings. In addition, Mr. Tananbaum is a Lead Portfolio Manager for GoldenTree Loan Management. Mr. Tananbaum chairs GoldenTree Asset Management’s Executive Committee and is a member of the Risk Committee and Distressed Committee. A veteran of the credit markets with over 30 years of investing experience, Mr. Tananbaum founded GoldenTree in 2000 and was instrumental in building the firm into an organization that is highly regarded for its investment process and partnership culture. Known for its focus on fundamental and relative value analysis, GoldenTree has produced strong competitive returns across product lines since its inception. The firm has grown into an organization of 24 partners, approximately 250 employees and nearly $47 billion of assets under management. Prior to forming GoldenTree, Mr. Tananbaum spent over a decade at MacKay Shields. He was head of the firm’s high yield group beginning on June 1, 1991 and, in 1997, founded its hedge fund business and served as the lead portfolio manager. Under Mr. Tananbaum’s leadership, MacKay Shields’ high yield mutual funds were rated in the top 5% by Lipper from June 1, 1991 through December 31, 1999. Prior to joining MacKay Shields, Mr. Tananbaum worked primarily on high yield and merger & acquisition transactions in the corporate finance department of Kidder, Peabody & Co. He is a graduate of Vassar College with a B.A. in Economics. Mr. Tananbaum is a CFA charterholder. He is a Member of the Board of Trustees of The Museum of Modern Art and a Member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

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Amit Thanki

CAIA, Senior Investment Officer, San Bernardino County Employees' Retirement Association

Mr. Thanki is a Senior Investment Officer with the San Bernardino County Employees’ Retirement Association (SBCERA). As a member of the investment team, he oversees the deployment of $2.5 billion in pension assets across multiple strategies with a focus on value, contractual income, and relationship structuring.

Prior to joining SBCERA in April 2012, Mr. Thanki was an Investment Analyst at Orange County Employees’ Retirement System (OCERS) where he was responsible for the oversight of the hedge fund, public equity, and public fixed income portfolios. He started his investment career at PIMCO and as a member of the marketing and business development group focusing on fixed income strategies in emerging markets, high yield and structured credit.

Mr. Thanki has over sixteen years of experience in the investment management industry and received the Money Management Intelligence 2013 Rising Star of Public Funds award. He earned his MBA from the Paul Merage School of Business at the University of California, Irvine and has a BS in Business Management from Oklahoma State University. Additionally, Mr. Thanki is a Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst (CAIA) charter holder and a member of the CAIA Association.

Ryan Tolkin

Chief Executive Officer and Chief Investment Officer, Schonfeld Strategic Advisors LLC

Ryan Tolkin is the Chief Executive Officer and Chief Investment Officer of Schonfeld and a member of the three-person Executive Committee of SGH. Ryan joined the Firm in 2013 and is responsible for firmwide strategic initiatives, investment, risk and business development teams, as well as capital allocation decisions. Prior to joining SGH, from 2008 to 2013, Ryan worked as part of the Corporate Credit Trading team at Goldman Sachs where he was responsible for managing the Energy/Utilities and REITs portfolios. He graduated in 2008 from Duke University with a degree in economics and both Phi Beta Kappa and magna cum laude honors.

Peter van Dooijeweert

Managing Director, Head of Multi-Asset Solutions, Man Group

Peter van Dooijeweert is Head of Multi-Asset Solutions at Man Solutions. Peter is responsible for assisting clients develop bespoke, actively managed investment programmes and also manages Man Group’s institutional hedging platform. Peter specialises in designing risk mitigating portfolios through the use of futures and options overlays, combined with diversifying Man Group discretionary and systematic strategies.

Prior to joining Man Group in June 2018, Peter was a portfolio manager at Paloma Partners between 2013 and 2017, where he was responsible for managing a global volatility portfolio and a multi-asset tail hedge protection plan. He started his career with Goldman Sachs in Tokyo in 1995 before moving on to Soros as a volatility portfolio manager. Subsequently, he launched and managed a volatility hedge fund seeded by Tudor Investment.

Peter holds a degree in accountancy from Wake Forest University and also studied at Tokai University in Japan.

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Charles Van Vleet

Assistant Treasurer, Chief Investment Officer of Pension Investments, Textron Inc.

Charles Van Vleet is Assistant Treasurer and Chief Investment Officer of Pension Investments at Textron Inc., Providence RI*. Together with an investment team of four, Charles has Trustee oversight of $10.6BN in defined benefit and defined contribution assets for Textron’s U.S., Canada and UK Plans providing retirement security for over 75,00 current and past employees. The Textron retirement Plans are well funded with broadly diversified investments including private equity, hedge funds, real estate, fixed income and public equity. In addition to investment oversight, Charles serves as a Member of Textron’s Investment Committee, Investment Management group, Employee Benefits Committee, Trustee and Board Member of Textron’s UK and Canadian Plans.

Prior to Textron, Charles spent 8 years as Director, Pension Investments at United Technologies in Hartford CT. Prior to pension investment Charles spent 25 years in the asset management divisions of Credit Suisse, Putnam Investments, Alliance Capital, Brown Brothers Harriman and Nomura Securities. At different times -living and working in New York, London and Tokyo- he has had the opportunity to manage ‘40 Act mutual funds, high net worth, endowment, public pension and corporate pension funds.

Charles holds bachelors’ degrees in Economics and Political Science from UC Berkeley, Berkeley CA and an MBA from the University of CT (UCONN) in Storrs, CT. Currently, Charles is a member of the Board of Directors and Chair of the Investment Subcommittee for CIEBA (Committee on Investment of Employee Benefit Assets) and serves on the investment advisory board for the Lifespan endowment, Rhode Island’s largest not-for-profit health care system. In addition, he serves on the advisory board for Rhode Island’s Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC), advisory committee for the Washington DC based, Managed Fund Association (MFA), Industry Affairs Committee for the Institutional Limited Partners’ Association (ILPA) and Defined Contribution Alternatives Association (DCALTA).

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Trent Webster

Senior Investment Officer, Strategic Investments, Florida State Board of Administration

Trent Webster is the Senior Investment Officer – Strategic Investments for the State Board of Administration of Florida, which manages approximately $204 billion for a variety of mandates in the state of Florida, including the $161 billion Florida Retirement System.  He is responsible for $14 billion of investments in hedge funds, private debt, real assets, insurance, principle investments, and other alternative investments.  Mr. Webster also was responsible for Private Equity for over a year.  Prior to being appointed Senior Investment Officer, Mr. Webster ran the Special Situations fund for the State Board of Administration, a US-focused, catalyst-driven public equity fund, and was responsible for external manager oversight in the Domestic Equities department.  Prior to coming to the State Board, Mr. Webster worked at Sprucegrove Investment Management and ScotiaMcLeod.  He has a Master’s in Business Administration from the University of Toronto and a Bachelor of Commerce (Honours) from the University of Saskatchewan.  Mr. Webster is a Chartered Financial Analyst.

 

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Michael Weinberg

Managing Director, Head of Hedge Funds and Alternative Alpha, APG Asset Management  
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Justin Young

Director, Portable Alpha, South Carolina Retirement System Investment Commission

Justin Young is the Director for Portable Alpha at the South Carolina Retirement System Investment Commission where he spearheaded a restructuring effort for the top-quartile, $4bn hedge fund program. Prior to his current role he has covered multiple asset classes including core fixed income, commodities, GTAA, equity options, and other opportunistic investments. Before joining RSIC Justin was a Research Analyst at Bridgewater Associates.  Justin is a CAIA charter holder and a graduate of the University of South Carolina Honors College where he doubled majored in Finance and Economics.

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David Zervos

Chief Market Strategist, Jefferies LLC

David Zervos is currently Chief Market Strategist for Jefferies LLC and Head of the Global Macro Division of Leucadia Asset Management, LLC (“LAM”). David joined Jefferies in 2010 after spending 2009 as a visiting advisor at the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System in Washington, D.C. Prior to visiting the Federal Reserve, he held a variety of research, sales and trading positions in the private sector, most recently managing global macro portfolios for Brevan Howard and UBS O’Connor. He began his career as an economist at the Federal Reserve Board in the early 1990’s. He received a B.Sc. from Washington University, and an M.A. and Ph.D. in economics from the University of Rochester.

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Christian Zugel

Founder and CIO, ZAIS Group, LLC

Mr. Zugel serves as Founder and CIO of ZAIS and is also Chairman of the company’s Management Advisory Committee.  Before founding ZAIS in 1997, Mr. Zugel was Head of High Yield Proprietary Trading with J.P. Morgan Securities Inc., where he led J.P. Morgan’s entry into many new trading initiatives.  At J.P. Morgan, Mr. Zugel also served on the Asia Pacific management-wide and firm wide market risk committees.  Mr. Zugel received a Masters in Economics from the University of Mannheim, Germany.