MFA Network Boston 2024 - Speakers
June 10, 2024 - June 11, 2024
Conference
Boston Harbor Hotel
Boston, MA
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Sudhir Anantharaman
Chief Information Security Officer
AQR Capital Management
Sudhir Anantharaman is the Chief Information Security Officer of AQR Capital Management, LLC, and oversees the information and cyber security function globally. Prior to AQR, he was a Director at Booz Allen Hamilton in that firm’s Financial Services Practice. Sudhir earned a B.S. in Engineering at the University of Illinois, a M.S. in Engineering at the University of Michigan, and an M.B.A. in Finance at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.
Jan-Paul Bruynes
Partner
Akin
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.
Pablo E. Calderini
President & Chief Investment Officer
Graham Capital Management
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.
Nicholas C. Cassin
Partner
Sidley Austin LLP
NICHOLAS CASSIN is a leading practitioner in the secondaries space. He has extensive experience advising secondaries buyers and fund sponsors on a full range of fund liquidity transactions across multiple alternative asset classes, including private equity, real estate, venture capital, and infrastructure. His secondary market experience includes traditional portfolio sales, preferred equity and stapled secondaries, and GP-led fund restructurings. For more than 15 years, Nicholas has applied his extensive secondaries experience to work with clients on all types of liquidity solutions transactions in private markets, representing an excess of US$50 billion in value.
In 2018, he was named to Secondaries Investor’s list of the “Next Gen Leaders of Secondaries.”
Prior to joining Sidley, Nicholas was a partner at another global elite law firm in their investment funds and transactional practice.
Kevin Cole, PhD
Chief Executive Officer & Chief Investment Officer
Campbell
Kevin Cole, Ph.D.
Chief Executive Officer & Chief Investment Officer
Dr. Cole joined Campbell & Company as a quantitative researcher in October 2003 and assumed the combined role of Chief Executive Officer & Chief Investment Officer (CEO, CIO) in January of 2022. Dr. Cole has served as Chief Investment Officer since July 2017. In his role as CEO, CIO, he is responsible for leading the firm’s overall strategic direction while also establishing and managing the firm’s investment research agenda. As co-chair of the firm’s Investment Committee, he is also responsible for daily risk and portfolio oversight. Prior to joining Campbell, Kevin held researcher roles at Mellon Capital Management, American Century Investments, and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Kevin received a Ph.D. in Economics with a concentration in Finance from the University of California at Berkeley and a B.A. in Economics from Georgetown University. His research has been published in The Journal of Fixed Income and Financial Analysts Journal.
Bryan Corbett
President & Chief Executive Officer
MFA
Bryan Corbett is MFA’s President and CEO. He is a veteran of Washington and Wall Street. For the past 12 years, he was a senior executive at The Carlyle Group, most recently as Managing Director in the Corporate Private Equity segment and Head of the firm’s OneCarlyle Global Investment Resources Group. In this role, Mr. Corbett and his team provided strategic and operational support to investment teams and portfolio companies across segments.
For the first half of his Carlyle tenure, Mr. Corbett managed U.S. government and regulatory issues affecting Carlyle, its investments and the industry. In this role, he developed legislative and regulatory strategies relating to all of Carlyle’s business segments, including private equity, credit and real estate. In addition to serving on the boards of several Carlyle portfolio companies, Mr. Corbett started the firm’s global corporate citizenship program focused on responsible investing, published Carlyle’s inaugural corporate citizenship report, and started the firm’s initiative to recruit and place diverse individuals on portfolio company boards in the U.S.
Prior to joining Carlyle, Mr. Corbett served in the George W. Bush Administration as a Special Assistant to the President for Economic Policy and as the Senior Advisor to Deputy Secretary Robert Kimmitt at the Treasury Department. He also served as Majority Counsel on the Senate Banking Committee.
Mr. Corbett earned his JD from George Washington University Law School, where he was editor-in-chief of the George Washington Law Review, and earned his BA from University of Notre Dame.
Ronan Cosgrave
Partner
Albourne Partners
Ronan is a Partner at Albourne Partners responsible for the coverage of global multi-strategy hedge funds. Prior to that he was a Partner at PAAMCO and PAAMCO Prisma, where he held various roles including Sector Specialist for Convertible Bond Hedging and Portfolio Manager for Liability Driven Investing. Ronan has an MBA from Columbia Business School with concentrations in Finance and Investment Management and a bachelor’s in Chemical and Process Engineering from Munster Technological University.
Molly Daniels
Director, Capital Introduction
UBS
Jonathan Danziger
Partner
Lowenstein Sandler LLP
Jonathan A. Danziger advises investment management clients in all aspects of their business.
Jonathan has extensive experience counseling clients on the forming and structuring of private funds and management companies, regulatory and compliance matters, public and private investment opportunities and shareholder engagement and activist campaigns.
Prior to joining Lowenstein, Jonathan was the General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer at Glenview Capital Management, where he was responsible for all legal and compliance matters. While at Glenview, Jonathan provided strategic advice on investment product development; developed, implemented, and enforced the firm’s compliance program; responded to regulatory exams and inquiries; and advised on day-to-day operational, trading, securities and corporate issues. Jonathan has a keen understanding of the inner workings of how funds and investment managers operate, and he takes a proactive, problem-solving, detail-oriented, and “hands-on” approach to his practice and his relationship with his clients. Above all, Jonathan takes pride in understanding his clients’ needs and the ability to provide them with thoughtful, thorough, experienced, and actionable advice.
Prior to joining Glenview, Jonathan served as an associate in the Investment Management Group of another leading law firm serving the investment management community for over 7 years.
As a highly regarded and leading investment management lawyer, Jonathan is a frequent panelist on legal and compliance topics at investment management industry conferences.
James A. David
Partner
The Baupost Group
James focuses on a broad range of public and private credit and equity situations. He joined Baupost in 2009 after graduating with an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School where he was a Baker Scholar. Prior to and concurrent with his time at HBS, James worked in Goldman Sachs’ Special Situations Group. James received an A.B. in Economics from Harvard College in 2005. He serves on the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center Trustee Advisory Board and Finance Committee.
Michael Dickenson
Peter Donovan
Executive Vice President and Managing Director, Chief Operating Officer
MFA
Peter Donovan is MFA’s Executive Vice President & Managing Director, Chief Operating Officer. He is responsible for MFA operations and finance, including accounting, budgeting, human resources and technology. He also leads and directs all efforts related to membership retention, development and growth. Mr. Donovan divides his time between MFA’s Washington D.C. and New York offices.
Mr. Donovan is a respected industry veteran with more than 25 years of experience. He joins MFA from Bank of America Merrill Lynch where he has served since 2004 in a variety of leadership roles in Fixed Income Prime Brokerage, sales and relationship management. He was previously co-head of U.S. prime brokerage sales at Morgan Stanley. Mr. Donovan holds a Bachelor’s degree in Finance from Lehigh University and a MBA from Fordham University.
Daniel Ehrmann
Partner, Head of Restructuring
King Street
Daniel Ehrmann is a Partner and Head of Restructuring at King Street. He is based in New York and is a member of the Management Committee.
Prior to joining King Street in 2015, Daniel was a Partner in the restructuring practice at Alvarez & Marsal. Prior to Alvarez & Marsal, Daniel held Associate positions in the M&A practices of Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton as well as at Salès Vincent & Associés.
Daniel received a L.L.M. in Corporation Law from New York University School of Law, a post graduate degree in Business and Economic Law (DEA en droit des Affaires et Droit Economique) from Sorbonne Paris I University, and a Masters in Commercial Law (Maitrise en Droit des Affaires et Droit Fiscal des Societes, J.D. equivalent) in Business Law from Assas Paris II University.
Charlie Flanagan
Head of Applied AI
Balyasny
Charlie Flanagan, CFA is the Head of Applied AI, based in our New York office. Prior to his current role, he was the Head of Data Science for BAM Elevate. Charlie joined BAM in May 2022 following five years at Google, where he worked as a Senior Data Science Technical Lead on Google Duplex. Charlie also worked at QuantRes Fund as a Quantitative Trading Manager. Prior to QuantRes Fund, he was an Equity Derivatives Dealer at ICAP Plc. Charlie received a Master of Business Administration from Columbia University and holds a Masters in Software Engineering from Harvard University.
Marc Friedberg, CFA
Managing Director
Wilshire Private Markets
Marc is a Managing Director with Wilshire and leads the Alternatives Solutions team. He serves on the private markets Management Research Committee and its Investment Committee, and leads the private markets advisory and customized solutions efforts. He is also responsible for sourcing, performing due diligence, and monitoring investments across private markets sectors within the U.S.
Marc joined Wilshire in 1999 and has consulting experience with many types and sizes of investment funds, including corporate and public pension funds, endowments and foundations. Marc also has extensive experience structuring institutional portfolios across all asset classes for a broad range of client types and portfolio objectives.
Marc received a BA degree as a dual business/communications major and an MBA with a concentration in finance and economics from the University of Pittsburgh. He also holds the Chartered Financial Analyst designation and is a member of the Pittsburgh Society of Financial Analysts.
Suzanne Gibbons
Managing Member
Davidson Kempner
Ms. Gibbons joined Davidson Kempner in July 2007. Ms. Gibbons was appointed Managing Director in January 2015 and became a Managing Member in January 2020. From 2003 to 2005, Ms. Gibbons worked as an Associate at Montgomery & Co., advising healthcare companies on private placements and mergers and acquisitions. From 2001 to 2003, she was an Analyst in the healthcare investment banking group at JPMorgan. Ms. Gibbons received her M.B.A. from Harvard Business School in 2007 and her B.A. from Dartmouth College in 2001.
Scott Gonsoulin, CFA
Director, Public Markets
Teacher Retirement System of Texas
Scott Gonsoulin is a Director on the Public Markets team at the Teacher Retirement System of Texas, a public pension system serving 1.6 million active and retired educators and their families. Scott supports the Trust’s portfolio of externally managed public market assets with oversight of the externally managed Emerging Markets allocation and credit hedge funds.
Prior to joining TRS in 2011, Scott served two years with Teach for America in Los Angeles, teaching 8th grade math.
Scott received his M.S. in Finance and B.A. in Accounting from Texas A&M University.
Cedric Henley
Partner and Chief Risk Officer of Specialty Finance
SLR Capital Partners
Cedric Henley is a Partner, SLR’s Chief Risk Officer of Specialty Finance and a founding member of SLR Capital Partners. Mr. Henley sits on the Board of Directors and chairs the Investment Committees of SLR Credit Solutions, SLR Business Credit, SLR Healthcare ABL, SLR Equipment Finance and Kingsbridge. Prior to joining SLR in 2007, Mr. Henley worked for CIBC World Markets from 1996 to 2007, where he was responsible for the West Coast Leveraged Finance Office, overseeing a portfolio of approximately $1.0 billion of predominantly senior secured debt. He has worked closely with a wide variety of private equity firms and strategic companies in industries such as consumer products, aerospace and defense, chemicals, industrials and gaming, lodging and leisure where he structured and underwrote senior credit facilities, mezzanine debt, junior debt and high yield issuances. From 1990 to 1996, Mr. Henley worked in the Project Finance, Energy, and Corporate Banking groups at Union Bank of California, working with environmental service companies and larger middle market companies. Mr. Henley holds a B.A. in Political Science from the University of Southern California.
Paul Kamenski
Co-Head of Credit
Man Numeric
Paul Kamenski is Co-Head of Systematic Credit at Man Numeric. He is responsible for the development and day-to-day portfolio management of all systematic credit strategies. Paul began his tenure at Man Numeric in 2012 as a portfolio analyst. In 2014, he became a member of the strategic alpha research team where he took the lead in Man Numeric’s research efforts into the fixed income corporate bond strategy space. Before joining Man Numeric, Paul was a corporate analyst at MF Global. Prior to that, he worked at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Paul received a bachelor’s degree in materials engineering from the University of Wisconsin, and a master’s degree in materials modeling from the University of Oxford.
Michelle Kelner
Co-Founder / Senior Partner
Sandglass Capital Advisors LLC
Ms. Kelner is a Co-Founder of Sandglass Capital Management. During her career, Ms. Kelner held senior roles in emerging markets asset management in executive management, trading, and investment roles, including as Senior Partner at Prince Street Capital, and other roles at SAC Capital, Tudor Investment and Hermitage Capital. Ms. Kelner began her career in investment banking at JP Morgan. Ms. Kelner serves on the Advisory Board of the University of Virginia’s McIntire School of Commerce and the Board of the Marks JCH, a Jewish community center in Brooklyn. Ms. Kelner graduated with distinction from the University of Virginia, where she studied finance and economics. She is fluent in Russian and conversant in French.
Matt Kiraly
Global Head of Prime Finance Origination and Equity Finance Sales; Head of Securities Financing Sales, Americas
HSBC
Matt Kiraly is Head of Platform Sales and Head of ESG sales for HSBC in the Americas.
Furthermore, Matt manages the Origination Team globally for HSBC’s Securities Financing business.
He has over 20 years’ experience focusing on clients across a number of major sell-side institutions.
Steve Klar
President
Wellington
Steve is president of the firm and serves as one of the firm’s three managing partners, who are collectively responsible for the governance of the Wellington Management partnership. As president, Steve works closely with our CEO in managing the entire firm and has primary responsibility for our Client and Infrastructure Platforms, as well as our global heads of office. He is also a member of the Executive Committee and the Operating Committee.
Prior to joining the firm in 2004, Steve was a partner at McKinsey & Company and one of the leaders of the North American Asset Management Practice. He began his career as an attorney, practicing corporate and tax law in Montreal, Canada.
Steve earned his Master of Laws (LLM) degree from Cornell University and his common and civil law degrees from McGill University in Montreal, where he was awarded the Gold Medal for the most distinguished standing.
Seth A. Klarman
CEO & Portfolio Manager
The Baupost Group
Seth is the Chief Executive Officer and Portfolio Manager of Baupost and has overseen the firm’s investments since its inception. Seth is the author of “Margin of Safety,” a book that outlines his value investment philosophy, and the editor of and contributor to the Benjamin Graham and David Dodd classic “Security Analysis, Seventh Edition.” He graduated magna cum laude from Cornell University with a B.A. in Economics and was a Baker Scholar at Harvard Business School, where he earned his MBA. Between his undergraduate and graduate studies, Seth worked in an analyst capacity for Mutual Shares Corporation. He is a member of Harvard Business School’s Board of Dean’s Advisors and serves on the board of the Broad Institute. He is Vice Chair of Beth Israel Hospital’s Board of Managers and a member of their Board of Trustees. In 2020, he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He is also the co-chairman of The Klarman Family Foundation. Seth regularly teaches in investment classes at leading colleges and business schools and speaks at various industry gatherings.
Kelly Koscuiszka
Partner
Schulte Roth & Zabel
Kelly Koscuiszka serves as co-chair of the Investment Management Regulatory & Compliance Group, where she advises private funds on regulatory and compliance matters, particularly the Investment Advisers Act of 1940. Kelly supports clients undergoing SEC examinations, including by handling deficiency letters and enforcement referrals and also uses that experience to assist clients with exam preparedness. Kelly specializes in the intersection of regulation and emerging technologies, including artificial intelligence, alternative data, web scraping and electronic communications. She also advises clients on data privacy and cybersecurity. Kelly regularly conducts client training sessions and is a sought-after presenter at leading industry conferences. Kelly is admitted to the Bar in New York and has Court Admissions in the US Supreme Court; the US District Court of New Jersey; and the US District Courts in Eastern and Southern Districts of New York.
Kelly received her J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center and her B.A. from Rutgers University.
Andy Kreuz
Deputy CIO WorldQuant & CEO
WorldQuant Millennium Advisors (WMA)
Mr. Kreuz is the Deputy Chief Investment Officer at WorldQuant, helping to oversee the firm’s portfolio management organization and working on a variety of strategic business initiatives across the firm. His leadership role expanded in 2023 when he was appointed Chief Executive Officer of WorldQuant Millennium Advisors (WMA), responsible for the organization’s day-to-day operations while shaping and implementing the strategic direction set by the JV partners, WorldQuant and Millennium. Prior to joining WorldQuant in 2014 as Head of Business Development and Deputy Chief Operating Officer, Andy spent 11 years at Credit Suisse in the Investment Banking and Asset Management divisions. He earned his MBA from the University of St. Gallen (HSG) in Switzerland with concentrations in Finance and Economics.
Geoffrey W. Levin
Partner
Sidley Austin LLP
GEOFF LEVIN concentrates his practice on growth equity and venture investments in the life sciences and other complex business transactions and governance matters for private equity sponsors and their portfolio companies. Geoff has more than 30 years of experience representing clients across a number of industries in a variety of transactional matters, including domestic and cross-border M&A, leveraged buyouts, going private transactions, public and private securities offerings, proxy contests, spin-offs, joint ventures, recapitalizations, venture capital financing, growth equity investments, PIPEs, debt financings, restructurings, and workouts.
Geoff’s representations have covered a broad range of industries including life sciences, financial services, communications, energy, retail, automotive and heavy industrial.
Geoff regularly comments on developments in the healthcare industry and speaks at investment conferences and spearheaded a series of webinars on healthcare and life sciences topics for private equity investors. He is listed by IFLR 1000 as a leading M&A lawyer and has been recognized by Institutional Investor News as one of the “10 Rising Stars of Private Equity and M&A Law” and by Mergermarket as a “Dealmaker of the Year.”
Prior to joining Sidley, Geoff was a partner at another global law firm. Geoff received his J.D., magna cum laude and Order of the Coif, from the University of Minnesota, where he was executive editor of the Journal of International Economic Law & Policy, and a B.B.A., with high distinction, from the University of Michigan. He is admitted to practice in the State of New York.
Mitch Livstone, PhD
Chief Investment Officer, Arbitrage and Hedging Solutions
Fidelity Investments
Mitch Livstone is the chief investment officer of the Arbitrage and Hedging Solutions group at Fidelity Investments. Fidelity Investments is a leading provider of investment management, retirement planning, portfolio guidance, brokerage, benefits outsourcing, and other financial products and services to institutions, financial intermediaries, and individuals. Arbitrage and Hedging Solutions is an investment team within Fidelity’s Asset Management Solutions division, an investment organization that provides industry-leading multi-asset solutions and liquid alternatives investment capabilities to the retail and institutional marketplace.
In this role, Mr. Livstone is responsible for leading a team that develops and runs alternatives investment vehicles, focusing primarily on relative value arbitrage strategies and defensive hedging solutions.
Mr. Livstone started his career at Fidelity in the Fixed Income division, where he was a quantitative analyst and then a portfolio manager. Additionally, he worked as a portfolio manager at Harvard Management and Geode Capital Management, where he also led the arbitrage team. Prior to rejoining Fidelity, Mr. Livstone served as CIO and portfolio manager of a biotechnology-focused hedge fund.
Mr. Livstone earned his bachelor of science and master of science degrees in electrical engineering and applied physics from Case Western Reserve University and his PhD in electrical engineering and computer science from Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is also a CFA® charterholder.
Andrew W. Lo, PhD
QLS Advisors and MIT
Andrew W. Lo is the Charles E. and Susan T. Harris Professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management, director of MIT’s Laboratory for Financial Engineering, and principal investigator at MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. His healthcare-related research interests include: new financial engineering tools and business models for drug and device development and healthcare delivery; statistical methods for incorporating patient preferences into the drug approval process; predicting clinical trial outcomes via machine learning techniques; and novel funding and reimbursement models for creating a robust raregene therapy ecosystem. He is a co-founder and director of BridgeBio Pharma, a director of AbCellera, Atomwise, and Vesalius, a co-founder and chairman of QLS Advisors, and a member of the advisory board to the American Cancer Society’s BrightEdge Impact Fund. Dr. Lo received his B.A. in economics from Yale University and his A.M. and Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University.
Michael Medeiros, CFA
Macro Strategist
Wellington
Mike is a macro strategist and a member of the Global Macro and Fixed Income Team. In this capacity, he focuses on macro forecasting and analysis for the dollar-bloc economies, including the US, Canada, and New Zealand, and on US fiscal policy and politics. He contributes to the management of global portfolios for the firm’s clients around the world, and his research is critical to investors throughout the firm as he translates macro data into investable ideas and themes.
Prior to joining Wellington Management in 2011, Mike worked at O’Brien Management and State Street Global Advisors.
Mike received his BA in economics and politics from Bates College and his MA in economics from Boston University. Additionally, he holds the Chartered Financial Analyst designation and is a member of the CFA Institute and the CFA Society Boston.
Mike Monforth
Global Head
J.P. Morgan Capital Advisory Group
Michael Monforth is global head of Capital Advisory where he leads the Capital Introduction and Consulting function within Global Sales & Marketing. Michael has been working with and advising hedge fund clients since the mid-2000s. Prior to joining the Capital Advisory team, Michael was global co-head of the Hedge Fund sector within the Corporate & Investment Bank’s Investor Client Management group. In this capacity, Michael lived in London for five years and helped expand J.P. Morgan’s hedge fund focus outside the U.S. Michael previously worked in FIG banking covering Hedge Funds where he advised a number of clients on various corporate finance projects. Michael also held roles in Structured Finance Sales as well as Financial Risk Management the early part of his career at J.P. Morgan.
Michael joined heritage J.P. Morgan in 1998 and prior to that, he was with PriceWaterhouseCoopers for two years where he earned his CPA. Michael is married with three children and enjoys the outdoors, particularly mountain climbing.
Joseph M. Morrissey
Partner
Seward & Kissel LLP
Joseph M. Morrissey is a partner in the Investment Management Group at Seward & Kissel LLP. Mr. Morrissey works with sponsors and managers of various private investment funds and other pooled investment vehicles, including private equity funds, hedge funds, funds of funds, commodity pools, and various “hybrid” funds. In particular, Mr. Morrissey focuses on fund formation and structuring, the offering of interests by private investment funds, and the negotiation and documentation of such investments. Mr. Morrissey has significant experience in organizing both domestic and offshore partnerships and other investment vehicles, including separately managed accounts. Mr. Morrissey also represents fund sponsors in connection with seed-capital investments and represents funds of funds and other institutional investors in connection with their investments in private funds. Mr. Morrissey regularly counsels investment advisers, commodity pool operators and commodity trading advisors on regulatory and compliance matters, including the development of comprehensive compliance programs and in connection with applicable regulatory examinations. On the transaction side, Mr. Morrissey represents these clients in connection with their investment activities, including private equity and venture capital transactions, joint ventures and PIPEs transactions.
Mr. Morrissey served several years as a Member of the Private Investment Funds Committee of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York.
Mr. Morrissey was recognized as a key lawyer in The Legal 500 2023 “Investment Fund Formation and Management, Private Equity Funds (including Venture Capital)” category for Seward & Kissel – “Joseph Morrissey‘s clients include some of the most recognizable private equity firms, along with market fund sponsors.” Mr. Morrissey was recognized by IFLR 1000 as Highly Regarded in the practice areas of Hedge Funds and Private Equity Funds.
Mr. Morrissey received a B.A. from Drew University and a J.D. from Fordham University School of Law.
Salvatore Naro
CIO – Coherence Credit Strategies
Tiptree Advisors, LLC
Hon. Thomas R. Nides
Vice Chairman, Strategy & Client Relations
Blackstone
Thomas R. Nides is a Vice Chairman, Strategy and Client Relations at Blackstone. He supports a variety of strategic firmwide initiatives, special projects and focus on senior client relationships globally.
Before joining Blackstone, Mr. Nides served as the United States’ Ambassador to Israel from 2021 to 2023. Prior to that, he spent over a decade at Morgan Stanley in various capacities including Chief Operating Officer and Vice Chairman. Nides was appointed Deputy Secretary of State and Chief Operating Officer of the U.S. State Department by President Barack Obama and was awarded the nation’s highest diplomatic honor by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for his service. He has also previously been a senior leader at Credit Suisse, Fannie Mae, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, and on Capitol Hill.
Nides currently serves on the boards of the Partnership for Public Service, the International Rescue Committee, and the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). He formerly served as chairman of the board of the Woodrow Wilson Center. He received his B.A. from the University of Minnesota.
Tom Parker
Chief Investment Officer of Systematic Fixed Income
BlackRock
Tom Parker, CFA, Managing Director, is Chief Investment Officer of Systematic Fixed Income (“SFI”) at BlackRock. In this capacity Mr. Parker is responsible for all portfolio management and research (“alpha teams”) as well as portfolio construction across the SFI platform. Prior to taking on his current role, Mr. Parker was Deputy CIO. He is currently an active member of the SFI Investment, Research Approval, Model Management, and Executive committees. Mr. Parker’s service with the firm dates back to 2001, including his years with Barclays Global Investors (BGI), which merged with BlackRock in 2009. At BGI, he was the global co-head of credit investments covering both investment grade and high yield markets and a member of BGI’s Fixed Income Research Approval Committee. He led the development and implementation of BGI’s quantitative approach to corporate credit investing. Mr. Parker managed both long-only and long/short credit strategies used across BGI’s fixed income funds, including the 3D Capital Fund (a credit long/short strategy), the Capital Structure Fund and the Fixed Income Global Alpha Fund. Prior to BGI, he worked at JP Morgan and prior to that at CSFB. Mr. Parker earned a BS degree from the University of California at Berkeley in 1980 and an MBA degree in finance and international business from the University of Chicago in 1985.
Darrel Pfeifauf
Vice President Asset Allocation and Risk
Advocate Health
Darrel Pfeifauf serves as Vice President of Asset Allocation and Risk for Advocate Health, a mission-driven non-profit healthcare system headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina. In this role, Mr. Pfeifauf is responsible for the development and application of Asset Allocation and the Risk Management framework across the Advocate Health investment program. Additionally, he is responsible for the design, implementation, and management of Diversifying Assets strategies. Prior to joining Advocate in 2021, he served as a Portfolio Manager for Mercer Investment Management including responsibility to extension of staff engagements with Not-for-Profit institutions. Mr. Pfeifauf began his career as a Trader for Bridgewater Associates and then moved to an allocator role with the Washington University Investment Management Company. Mr. Pfeifauf holds a BSBA in Finance and Economics from the University of Tulsa and an MBA from Washington University. He currently serves on the Board of Directors for Build Missouri Health and is an investment committee member for the Missouri Foundation for Health.
Dr. Kiran Reddy, MD
Senior Managing Director
Blackstone Life Sciences, Cambridge
Kiran Reddy is a Senior Managing Director in the Blackstone Life Sciences group having joined in May 2020. Dr. Reddy was previously the President & CEO of Praxis Precision Medicines, which he co-founded in November 2016.
Previously, Dr. Reddy was at Biogen where he was part of the corporate development and strategy leadership team. Dr. Reddy was also an Associate Partner at Third Rock Ventures. He supported and managed various portfolio companies in addition to focusing on new company formation and new investments. He was part of the founding team and interim Chief Business Officer for SAGE Therapeutics through its IPO. Dr. Reddy was part of the team that launched Foundation Medicine, and he has served as a Board Observer for Alnara pharmaceuticals, Rhythm pharmaceuticals and PanOptica pharmaceuticals.
Dr. Reddy holds MD and MBA degrees from Georgetown University. He completed his internship in medicine and his neurology residency at Harvard/Massachusetts General Hospital. Dr. Reddy was previously a Howard Hughes science fellow and has authored several peer-reviewed scientific papers in the field of epilepsy, neuroimmunology and neurodegenerative diseases.
Graham Rennison
Executive Vice President, Quantitative Portfolio Manager
PIMCO
Mr. Rennison is an executive vice president in the quantitative portfolio management group in the Newport Beach office. He is the lead portfolio manager for systematic credit and interest rate strategies, and for the target volatility fund suite. Prior to joining PIMCO in 2011, Mr. Rennison was a director and head of systematic strategies research at Barclays in New York. Prior to that, he spent five years at Lehman Brothers in quantitative credit research in New York and London. He has 22 years of investment experience and holds master’s and undergraduate degrees in mathematics from Cambridge University, England.
Nora Richardson
Vice President, Membership & Investor Services
MFA
Prior to joining MFA, Nora was at Bank of America Securities as a Director in the Prime Brokerage Business Consulting team. Prior to that, Nora worked in both the U.S. and London offices of Bank of America as a prime brokerage account manager. She has more than thirteen years of experience serving equity, multi-strategy, and quantitative hedge funds of various sizes from new launches and emerging managers to institutionalized funds.
Nora graduated with honors from Fairfield University with a B.S. in mathematics and economics.
Andrea Romano
Head of Structure Credit Portfolio Management
Barclays
Andrea Romano is the Global Head of Structured Credit Portfolio Management at Barclays delivering financing solutions to institutional clients. Prior to joining Barclays in August 2020, Andrea spent 3 years at Morgan Stanley where she focused on providing financing to private credit managers, actively managing a portfolio of private credit companies and building out internal infrastructure. Prior to joining Morgan Stanley, Andrea spent 11 years at Antares Capital (fka GE Capital) underwriting, structuring and executing private equity sponsored, middle market leveraged transactions.
Andrea holds a BS in Chemical Engineering from Lehigh University, an MBA from Drexel University and is a CFA Charterholder.
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.
Jeff Shen, PhD
Managing Director, Co-CIO and Co-Head of Systematic Active Equity
BlackRock
Jeff Shen, PhD, Managing Director, is Co-CIO and Co-Head of Systematic Active Equity (SAE) at BlackRock. He is a member of the BlackRock Global Operating Committee, BlackRock Systematic (BSYS) Management Committee and the BlackRock Asian Middle Eastern & Allies Network (AMP) Executive Committee.
Dr. Shen’s service with BlackRock dates back to 2004, including his years with Barclays Global Investors (BGI), which merged with BlackRock in 2009. At BGI, he was the Head of Investment for Asia Pacific and Emerging Market active equities. Prior to joining BGI, he began his career in 1997 with JP Morgan where he held numerous positions in global macro investment and asset allocation research in both New York and London.
Dr. Shen earned a BA degree in Economics from Hobart College, a MA degree in Economics from University of Massachusetts at Amherst, and a PhD degree in Finance from New York University.
Dr. Shen is an adjunct professor at NYU teaching an MBA class on international investment. He also serves on the advisory board of the Clausen Center at UC Berkeley.
Woody Sherman, PhD
Chief Innovation Officer
Psivant Therapeutics
Woody Sherman is founder and Chief Innovation Officer at Psivant Therapeutics. Prior roles included Chief Computational Scientist at Roivant Sciences, Chief Scientific Officer at Silicon Therapeutics, and Global Head of Applications Science at Schrodinger. Woody received his B.S. in Physical Chemistry and B.A. in Creative Studies from the University of California at Santa Barbara (UCSB) and completed his Ph.D. at MIT. Woody has published over 100 peer-reviewed papers on a broad range of topics, including molecular dynamics, quantum mechanics, free energy simulations, enhanced sampling, virtual screening, induced-fit docking, protein design, small molecule optimization, machine learning, cheminformatics, hybrid ligand/structure-based methods, pharmacophore modeling, and more. Additionally, Woody is an Adjunct Professor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst (UMass) where he gives lectures on computational chemistry, drug design, innovation, and company creation.
Karen Simeone
Managing Director
HarbourVest Partners, LLC
Karen Simeone joined HarbourVest in 2018 and focuses on investments in senior and junior private credit transactions.
Throughout her career, Karen has managed all aspects of the private credit investment process including sourcing, evaluating, structuring, underwriting and managing secured debt securities of middle market companies. Prior to joining the Firm, Karen was a managing director at TCW in the Direct Lending Group (formerly Regiment Capital’s direct lending team). Karen previously worked at Stairway Capital and HVB Group. Karen began her career at J.P. Morgan as part of the leveraged finance group and later became a member of the high yield research team.
Karen received a BS from Georgetown University in 1998 and studied at the London School of Economics.
Alex Smith
Portfolio Strategist
Bridgewater Associates
Alex joined Bridgewater in 2010 and is currently a Portfolio Strategist in our Research group. In addition to conducting macroeconomic research, he communicates with Bridgewater’s clients regarding the macro outlook, Bridgewater strategies, and portfolio construction. He has expertise in portfolio construction, currencies, credit, commodity, and equity markets. Before joining Bridgewater, Alex was a consultant for Oliver Wyman Financial Services. He has an M.A. in Applied Mathematics and Statistics from Hunter College, and an A.B. in Philosophy from Princeton University.
James Smith
Director
BofA Securities
James is a Director on the Capital Strategies team at BofA. The Capital Strategies Team supports its Prime Financing clients with strategic business building initiatives. James began his career as a capital allocator at Cambridge Associates in Boston covering equity long/short, event-driven, and distressed credit managers. Prior to joining BofA in June 2022, James invested in and helped scale new hedge fund launches at Stable Asset Management, a $3B alternatives investment firm. James leads the Emerging Manager Program at BofA and is based in One Bryant Park, in New York City.
George Stathis
Head of Boston Markets Sales and Senior Relationship Manager
Citi
George Stathis is a Managing Director and the Head of Boston Markets Sales at Citi, where he oversees the firm’s Equity and Fixed Income sales efforts in the region. He also serves as a Senior Relationship Manager for some of the largest institutional asset managers in the world. He has held these roles since early 2020.
George managed Citi’s Institutional Equity Sales effort in Boston from 2014 to 2020, and prior to that time worked as part of the team from 2010 to 2014. He originally started at Citi in 1998, after graduating from business school.
He took a leave from Citi in 2004 and went off to co-found two real estate companies, Live Oak Group and Live Oak Property Group, which focused on mixed-used development and land entitlement. He ran both of these businesses until he returned to Citi in 2010.
George started his career at Lockheed Martin, as part of their Operations Leadership Development Program where he worked at several locations in Florida and New Jersey.
George graduated magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Maryland in 1992 with a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering. He also graduated from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania in 1998 with an MBA, a degree he earned with distinction.
He currently serves on the Board of Trustees for Youth Enrichment Services, and on the Stewardship Committee for St. Andrew’s Church. George is a Chartered Financial Analyst.
George lives in Wellesley, MA with his wife Jacquelyn and two daughters.
Aaron Stern
Managing Partner & Chief Investment Officer
Converium Capital
Aaron Stern is a Managing Partner and the Chief Investment Officer of Converium Capital, a multi-strategy opportunistic investment manager headquartered in Montreal. Converium aims to deliver positive and uncorrelated returns regardless of macroeconomic conditions by investing in distressed and event-driven opportunities globally and across the capital structure. Prior to founding the firm, Aaron was a Partner and Managing Director at Fir Tree Partners, a multi-strategy investment firm founded by Jeffrey Tannenbaum. At Fir Tree, Aaron was responsible for distressed, special situations and event-driven investments globally where he successfully employed his contrarian idea selection in new areas for the firm, including sovereign and municipal debt, emerging markets and engagement opportunities in Europe and Asia. He led an innovative restructuring of Puerto Rico’s Government Development Bank and a campaign to improve governance and shareholder returns at a privatized Japanese railway operator. Prior to Fir Tree, Aaron held investment roles at O.S.S. Capital Management and Millennium Management. Before Millennium, he was an investment banking analyst in Credit Suisse’s Leveraged Finance and Restructuring groups. He earned his bachelor’s degree in Commerce, with a Major in Accounting from McGill University, where he is a Global Expert and guest lecturer.
Anne-Sophie van Royen
Chief Investment Officer, Quantitative Strategies
Asset Management One USA Inc.
Anne-Sophie van Royen serves as Asset Management One USA’s Chief Investment Officer, Quantitative Strategies. She is responsible for overseeing all aspects of the firm’s quantitative investment programs including the research process, portfolio management and trade execution. Dr. van Royen manages AMO USA’s quantitative investment team. Prior to joining AMO, Ms. van Royen worked at la Caisse de Depot et Placement du Quebec in Montreal, first as Head of Global Tactical Asset Allocation then as Head of Quantitative Equity. Prior to CDPQ she served for 4 years as an Advisor in the Managing Director’s Office at the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, covering all matters pertaining to Tactical Asset Allocation. She was previously Head of Global Tactical Asset Allocation at Credit Suisse Asset Management in New York between 2004 and 2011. She began her career in Mergers and Acquisitions with Goldman Sachs in London.
Ms. van Royen hold a Ph.D and M.Sc in Mathematical Economics from the University of Paris – Sorbonne. She also holds a B.A in Psychology and an M.A. in Business from HEC Paris. She has published articles in a variety of professional investment journals, including the Financial Analysts Journal, Journal of Portfolio Management, Journal of Derivatives and Journal of Forecasting. She is a Past President of the Society of Quantitative Analysts in New York and served as an advisor in the Department of Mathematics at the New Jersey Institute of Technology.
Laura Tadvalkar, PhD
Managing Director
RA Capital Management
Laura Tadvalkar is a Managing Director on the Venture Team at RA Capital Management. Laura works on new company creation and early-stage investments, and serves as a Board Director for Be Biopharma, Expansion Therapeutics, Hemab, and Aliada Therapeutics. Laura has a BS in Chemistry from Yale University and a PhD in Chemical Biology from Harvard University. Prior to RA, Laura was a Principal at MP Healthcare Venture Management. Prior to MP, she was a Consultant at Clarion Healthcare.
John Wright
Global Head of Credit
Bain Capital
Mr. Wright joined Bain Capital in 2000. He is a Partner and Global Head of Credit, based in the Boston office. Mr. Wright is a Portfolio Manager, Credit Committee member and oversees the firm’s Liquid, Structured and Private Credit investment strategies. Prior to his current role, Mr. Wright was the Co-Head of Liquid and Structured Credit, and has led the firm’s CLO business since 2016. Mr. Wright received a Bachelor of Arts from Tufts University, and is a Chartered Financial Analyst charter holder.
Sina Yeganeh, PhD
Portfolio Manager
Hudson Bay Capital
Sina Yeganeh is the manager of an Emerging Markets portfolio at Hudson Bay Capital. He invests in hard-currency sovereign and corporate debt. Over his 13-year investment career he has traded global credit, rates, and volatility strategies. Before joining Hudson Bay in 2021, Sina was a portfolio manager at several hedge funds. Sina earned a B.S. in Chemistry from the California Institute of Technology, and a Ph.D. in Chemical Physics from Northwestern University. Before moving to finance, he was a postdoctoral researcher at MIT and authored 18 peer-reviewed publications in the fields of molecular electronics, quantum chemistry and dynamics.
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.
