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FPCM's team of professionals is made up of veterans from leading investment
banks and other financial institutions - specialists who are oriented toward
their areas of expertise: investment management and proprietary trading,
corporate finance, structured finance, risk management, and life insurance. At
First Principles Capital Management, we understand that today's complex markets
demand multidisciplinary expertise, and, as such, the composition of our team
is a key component of our success.
FPCM professionals are organized into two groups based on the services provided
to clients:
Investment Management/Structured Finance
Our people not only design well thought-out investment management solutions; they also have extensive experience in implementing a variety of investment strategies. At FPCM we recognize that best execution is critical to capturing the full value of any strategy.
- Douglas A. Dachille- Chief Executive Officer and Chief Investment Officer
- Richard F. Dolan- Chief Financial Officer
- James H Van Epps- Chief Operating Officer
- Mark G. Alexandridis- Managing Director, Asset Management
- Michael J. Baek- Managing Director, Structured Finance
- Hong Chen- Managing Director, Research, Trading Technology and Operations
- David Ho- Managing Director, Asset Management
- Prasad Kadiyala- Managing Director, Asset Management
- Robert R. Lewis- Managing Director, Business Development
- Mark F. Lieberman- Managing Director, Asset Management
- Stephen R. Miller- Managing Director & Chief Risk Officer
- John Duff- Vice President, Research and Technology
- Rongfeng "Becky" Li, CFA- Vice President, Asset Management
Douglas A. Dachille
- Chief Executive Officer and Chief Investment Office
As one of the founders of FPCM, Mr.
Dachille has more than 23 years of experience creating asset management
solutions for large institutions.Mr. Dachille's background and
knowledge encompass all aspects of asset management, structured finance, and
risk management. Immediately prior to co-founding FPCM, Mr. Dachille was
President and Chief Operating Officer of Zurich Capital Markets Inc. ("ZCM"),
an integrated alternative investment asset management and structured product
subsidiary of Zurich Financial Services.
Preceding his tenure at ZCM, Mr. Dachille was a Managing Director for J.P.
Morgan where he was the Global Head of Proprietary Trading and a member of the
Management Committee of the Investment Bank. He was responsible for building
the Global Relative Value Proprietary Trading business, and in fiscal year 2000
this business was one of the most important contributors to both the pre-tax
net income and economic value for J. P. Morgan. In addition, Mr. Dachille was
responsible for managing the bank's investment portfolios, for developing and
executing economic and regulatory capital management strategies, and for
designing and managing non-qualified employee deferred compensation plans. Mr.
Dachille was Chairman of the firm's Capital Committee and served as a trustee
of the J. P. Morgan qualified benefit plans. Prior to his role in the
Proprietary Positioning business, Mr. Dachille was responsible for building the
Hybrid Derivatives business for J. P. Morgan beginning in 1991. The Hybrid
Derivatives business was developed to provide clients with customized
derivatives solutions to complex problems and continues to be a significant
revenue contributor for J. P. Morgan.
Mr. Dachille is frequently called upon by the financial press to comment on the economy and developments in the fixed income markets. His Op Eds have been published in financial journals including The Wall Street Journal and Barron’s and he has been frequently quoted in various financial publications. Doug is also a regular radio and television guest, including appearances on CNBC and Bloomberg Television and Radio programs.
Mr. Dachille earned his Bachelor of Science in a special joint program through
Union University and Albany Medical College, and later was a Pew Scholar in
Medicine, Arts and Social Sciences at the University of Chicago.
Richard F. Dolan
- Chief Financial Officer
Mr. Dolan brings over 26 years of
capital markets, structured finance, corporate finance, and M&A experience
to FPCM. Prior to helping found FPCM, Mr. Dolan founded First
Principles Finance, LLC, ("FPF") the predecessor firm of FPCM, in 2002.
Before he founded FPF, Mr. Dolan was a Managing Director at J. P. Morgan, where
he established and led the Insurance & Pension Derivatives business. This
business was consistently a market leader and provided structured high-quality
fixed-income strategies including synthetic Guaranteed Investment Contracts
(GICs), stable-value investments and structured fixed-income portfolios to
various institutional 401(k), pension, insurance and bank clients. Mr. Dolan
was also a trustee of the J. P. Morgan pension and welfare plans and was
responsible for the asset and liability management of the firm's non-qualified
employee benefit plans and their investments. In that capacity, he was
responsible for risk management and asset allocation, the purchase and
structuring of the firm's corporate-owned life insurance policies and employee
benefit liability design. Prior to founding J. P. Morgan's Insurance &
Pension Derivatives business, Mr. Dolan was a Vice President in the Mergers
& Acquisition group and taught in the firm's executive training programs.
Mr. Dolan received his Bachelor of Arts in Government from Franklin &
Marshall College, and his M.B.A. from Fordham University in New York City.
James H Van Epps
- Chief Operating Officer
Mr. Van Epps is recognized as a leading
expert in the corporate and bank-owned life insurance arena, and has over 30
years of experience in the complex insurance markets. In 2005 he integrated the
operations of Van Epps & Associates into FPCM.
Mr. Van Epps oversees FPCM's Atlanta operations as well as manages the
technological resources and administration of FPCM including accounting,
financial reporting and audit controls. He also coordinates FPCM's insurance
strategies.
In addition to his insurance expertise, Mr. Van Epps has extensive background
in the design, funding and administration of non-qualified benefit programs.
Over the past ten years, he has provided more than 100 major U.S. corporations
and banks with funding strategies and financing alternatives for their
broad-based employee benefit liabilities. Mr. Van Epps has been engaged as a
consultant by several major insurance companies for specialty product design.
Financial institutions have looked to him for consultation on funding
alternatives, investment strategies, overseeing investor relations and
compliance.
Mr. Van Epps earned a Bachelor's degree in Business Administration &
Finance from Georgia Southern University.
Stephen R. Miller
- Managing Director & Chief Risk Officer
Mr. Miller has over 26 years of
experience in risk management, research, and derivatives structuring and
trading. Immediately prior to joining FPCM, Mr. Miller was a
Managing Director at J. P. Morgan in charge of risk management coverage of the
Global Institutional Equities division, with oversight responsibilities for the
North American Interest Rate businesses.
During his 17 year career at J. P. Morgan, Mr. Miller held several other
positions including four years as Managing Director and Global Head of
Derivatives Research, four years as a founding member and senior trader in the
Hybrid Derivatives trading group (two of those years were spent in London
building the European group). The Hybrid Derivatives business delivered
customized derivatives' solutions to institutional clients, and continues to be
a major contributor to J. P. Morgan derivatives franchise. Prior to Hybrid
Derivatives trading, Mr. Miller spent one year as a French franc derivatives
trader & structurer, after spending his first three years as a derivatives
researcher supporting J.P. Morgan's fixed income derivatives effort.
Before joining J. P. Morgan, Mr. Miller worked for Powers Research Inc.,
serving as an asset/liability consultant for financial institutions, with a
focus on hedging strategies utilizing interest rate futures. For the first four
years of his career, starting in 1981, Mr. Miller worked for Equitable Life
Assurance of the U.S., and subsequently Metropolitan Life Insurance Co.,
developing new derivatives based investment products for defined benefit and
defined contribution pension plans, and formulating asset/liability strategy
related to the pension GIC business.
Mr. Miller earned his Bachelor's degree in Physics from Vassar College.
Hong Chen
- Managing Director, Research, Trading Technology and Operations
Mr. Chen has over 26 years of experience
structuring and trading complex derivatives, and has been an innovator in the
design and building of revolutionary risk management systems. Prior
to joining FPCM, Mr. Chen was a Managing Director at ZCM until May 2004. While
at ZCM, Mr. Chen was the Global Head of Trading, overseeing the firm's
traditional asset strategies as well as alternative investment assets trading.
Before ZCM, Mr. Chen was at J. P. Morgan for 16 years. He was a key member of
the firm's Hybrid Derivatives business, where he managed multi-currency swaps,
derivatives and foreign exchange portfolios. Mr. Chen also was responsible for
starting and building J. P. Morgan's Latin American interest rate derivatives
trading business. Also, he was involved in building the analytic infrastructure
for J. P. Morgan's interest rate derivatives business, and he was credited for
pioneering the now broadly used J. P. Morgan Fixed Income Derivatives Analytic
Library as well as the Swaps Credit Exposure system.
Mr. Chen received his Bachelor's degree in economics from the University of New
Hampshire, and his MBA from New York University.
Mark F. Lieberman
- Managing Director, Asset Management
Mr. Lieberman has over 24 years of
experience in the fixed income markets, with a strong background in derivatives
development, marketing, and trading. Prior to joining FPCM, Mr.
Lieberman was a Managing Director at Nomura Global Financial Products and
Nomura Securities International, Inc.
During his 17 year career at Nomura, Mr. Lieberman held positions in trading,
sales, and management roles. He headed Nomura's North American Fixed Income
Derivatives Business and Global Fixed Income Derivatives Trading. As a member
of Nomura's North American Operating and Management Committees, Mr. Lieberman
focused on building Nomura's domestic Fixed Income business and its integration
into Nomura's global platform. He has been involved in many innovations in the
fixed income derivatives marketplace, both stand alone, and with other fixed
income products and markets, including development and market making in several
of the first publicly issued hybrid transactions.
Before joining Nomura, Mr. Lieberman was a member of
Prudential Global Funding, one of the first interest rate derivatives
firms, established in 1985.
Mr. Lieberman earned a BA degree in Economics from the University of Michigan.
Mark G. Alexandridis
- Managing Director, Asset Management
Mr. Alexandridis brings over 24 years of
structured credit, credit trading, and derivatives experience to FPCM.
Prior to joining FPCM, Mr. Alexandridis worked for three years as a Managing
Director at BNP Paribas, where he was responsible for managing the firm's Flow,
Structured, and Proprietary Credit Trading businesses and was a member of the
Fixed Income Management Committee in the Americas.
Mr. Alexandridis was a Managing Director at General Re Financial Products
(GRFP) in charge of building and managing the Structured Credit Trading
business before joining BNP. Mr. Alexandridis built a credit correlation
capability that enabled GRFP to be among the first providers of the strategies
in the marketplace.
Prior to joining GRFP, Mr. Alexandridis was a Managing Director at J.P. Morgan
where he held a variety of senior derivative trading positions involving
trading and risk managing new derivative product (index, hybrid, & credit
derivatives) or adapting existing derivative technology to new markets
(emerging market swaps and foreign exchange options).
Mr. Alexandridis earned a Bachelor of Science and an M.S. from Massachusetts
Institute of Technology in Civil Engineering, as well as an M.S. from Carnegie
Mellon University in Operations Research.
Michael J. Baek
- Managing Director, Structured Finance
Mr. Baek has more than 21 years of
structured finance & capital markets experience, and a strong
background in related accounting, regulatory and tax matters. Prior
to joining FPCM, Mr. Baek was a Managing Director at Zurich Capital Markets.
While there, Mr. Baek was responsible for new product development and
securitization activities.
Prior to joining ZCM, Mr. Baek was a Senior Vice President at Lehman Brothers
Inc. where he was responsible for principal finance activities covering financial
institutions. In addition, Mr. Baek was
responsible for advising financial institutions on various fixed income and
capital markets strategies including structured finance & securitization,
balance sheet and capital management, derivatives strategies, and accounting /
regulatory developments. Prior to joining Lehman, Mr. Baek worked at TMG
Financial Products where he was responsible for structured product marketing.
Prior to TMG, Mr. Baek worked at Goldman Sachs & Co where he was
responsible for advising financial institutions on balance sheet restructuring
and asset/liability management.
Mr. Baek earned a Bachelor of Science in Aerospace Engineering from The State
University of New York at Buffalo, and Master of Science in Operations Research
from Stanford University.
Robert R. Lewis
- Managing Director, Business Development
Mr. Lewis has over 24 years of
experience marketing various investment, insurance and capital markets
strategies. Prior to joining FPCM, he was a Principal at The Todd
Organization, working with Fortune 500 industrial companies and large financial
institutions.
At the Todd Organization, Mr. Lewis focused on working with financial
executives to help optimize the funding and hedging of non-qualified benefit
liabilities. His expertise enabled companies to find the most effective ways to
finance current and post-retirement liabilities pertaining to supplemental
retirement plans and other employee benefit obligations. Mr. Lewis has held
leadership positions in financial industry associations, promoted industry
positions to Members of Congress, spoken at industry forums, and appeared on
CNBC television.
Mr. Lewis earned a Bachelor of Science in Finance from Lehigh University.
David Ho
- Managing Director, Asset Management
Mr. Ho has over 17 years of experience
in fixed income trading and research. Prior to joining FPCM, Mr.
Ho was the head of fixed income proprietary trading at Zurich Capital Markets
Inc. ("ZCM"). At ZCM, Mr. Ho was also the senior trader responsible for
managing the capital markets risk of the alterative assets book. Before joining
ZCM, Mr. Ho was a fixed income options trader at Salomon Brothers Inc.
Mr. Ho's areas of expertise include treasuries, swaps, agencies, mortgages,
municipal bonds, inflation-linked securities, and alternative assets. In
addition to years of trading experience, Mr. Ho spent several years in the
derivatives research department at Salomon Brothers Inc. building options
models and performing quantitative analysis.
Mr. Ho received his Bachelor of Science in Applied Mathematics from Harvey Mudd
College and his Ph.D. in Mathematics from Stanford University. Mr. Ho was a
National Science Foundation Fellow and a Post-Doctoral Fellow at the Stanford
University School of Medicine.
Rongfeng "Becky" Li, CFA
- Vice President, Asset Management
Ms. Li has 20 years of credit
analysis and trading experience. Prior to joining FPCM, Ms. Li was
the Credit Market Strategist for Primus Financial Products for more than two
years. In this capacity, she was responsible for analyzing the spectrum of US
and European investment grade credits.
Ms. Li served as Senior Vice President and Credit Analyst for a fixed income
hedge fund at Weiss, Peck, & Greer prior to joining Primus. She previously
served as a Senior Credit Analyst for Gen Re Financial Products covering the
retail, technology, telecom, aerospace/defense, and railroad sectors.
Prior to General Re, Ms. Li worked as an Associate Analyst in the Corporate
Finance Group at Moody's Investor's Service covering the metals and mining,
building materials, and aerospace/defense sectors for four years. Earlier in
her career, Ms. Li held positions with the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi and the
Georgia Department of Banking and Finance.
Ms. Li earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from Beijing Foreign Studies
University in Beijing, China, and received her M.B.A. from the University of
South Carolina.
Prasad Kadiyala
- Managing Director, Asset Management
Mr. Kadiyala has over 21 years
experience in quantitative analysis, modeling, and general management.
Prior to joining FPCM, Mr. Kadiyala worked in structured products sales at
Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein. In this capacity he was responsible for
covering regional dealers for interest rate derivative products and private
banks for structured products.
Prior to that starting in 1995, Mr. Kadiyala was the founder and President of
two startups VinKad Services Inc. and Foliometrics.com Inc. VinKad Services was
focused on providing computer based analysis and modeling to Engineering
companies. Foliometrics.com was focused on providing web based financial and
risk analysis to individual investors in partnership with online trading
platforms.
Mr. Kadiyala started his career working on structural design, safety, and
fatigue monitoring of US Naval planes. In this capacity, he developed models
and analysis tools for structural life extension of A6 Intruder and F14 Tomcat
Naval Planes. Following this he worked at American Electric Power in the area
engineering computer applications. As part of an accident investigation and
technical assessment group, Mr. Kadiyala was responsible for modeling and
recommending solutions for accidents ranging from pressure vessel ruptures,
turbine blade failures, to piping failures in nuclear plants.
Mr. Kadiyala earned his B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the Indian
Institute of Technology, Bombay (IIT) ; an M.S. in Engineering Sciences from
Virginia Tech (NASA Virginia Tech program in Composite Materials); and an MBA
from the University of California, Berkeley with a focus on quantitative
finance.
John Duff
- Vice President, Research and Technology
Mr. Duff has over 30 years of structured
finance and fixed income expertise. Prior to joining FPCM, Mr.
Duff worked at J.P. Morgan for more than 22 years. Most recently he was
responsible for creating an Investor Relations function for structured products
to address the needs of both investors and J.P. Morgan's market makers in
collateralized debt obligations (CDOs). In this capacity he spearheaded the
development of J.P. Morgan's first website devoted to structured products. He
also managed relationships with trustees, outside counsel, rating agencies and
software providers in support of the ongoing performance monitoring of J.P.
Morgan-originated deals.
Prior to his most recent assignment, Mr. Duff's roles included developing
systems for deal structuring in both the Asset Finance and Municipal Finance
groups, and the development of pricing and risk management tools for foreign
exchange and fixed income trading.
Prior to joining J.P. Morgan, Mr. Duff was with Lloyd Bush & Associates
where he was a software developer and product manager for tools used in the
structuring of municipal finance issues. Earlier in his career Mr. Duff was a
software product manager with The Service Bureau Corporation covering solutions
marketed to the financial services industry.
Mr. Duff holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics with a Computer Science minor
from Duke University and a Masters of Business Administration from New York
University.
Derek Peeke - Associate, Research, Trading Technology and Operations
Mr. Peeke has 11 years of experience in general management and financial analysis. Prior to joining FPCM, Mr. Peeke worked as a Derivatives Analyst for The Royal Bank of Canada with the operational team. In this capacity, he was responsible for the execution of fixed income products.
Before joining The Royal Bank of Canada, Mr. Peeke was a manager for Air Cruisers Company, the world's leading manufacturer of aircraft evacuation devices.
Prior to Air Cruisers, Mr. Peeke served in the United States Navy as a munitions expert on the USS Nitro.
W. Blair Garff- Director, Business Development
Mr. Garff has 35 years experience in marketing fixed
income and derivative products. Prior to FPCM, Mr. Garff worked as a Managing Director at
Morgan Stanley Investment Management. Prior to Morgan Stanley, Mr. Garff held various senior
positions at Goldman Sachs, TSA Capital Management, and Paine Webber.
Mr. Garff earned a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Utah and an MBA from Washington
University (St. Louis).
Insurance Strategies/Asset Administration
FPCM provides expert insurance advisory services and, through FPCM
Administrative Services, LLC, offers comprehensive asset administration to our
clients. We currently administer over $30 billion of separate and general
account business owned life insurance ("BOLI") for clients.
James H Van Epps
- Chief Operating Officer
Mr. Van Epps is recognized as a leading
expert in the corporate and bank-owned life insurance arena, and has over 25
years of experience in the complex insurance markets. He is one of the founding
partners and in 2005 integrated the operations of Van Epps & Associates
with FPCM.Mr. Van Epps was an early pioneer in the utilization of
institutional structured insurance products to finance broad based benefit
liabilities. In addition to his insurance expertise, Mr. Van Epps has extensive
background in the administration of non-qualified benefit programs.
FPCM Administrative Services, LLC administers over $30 billion of business
owned life insurance assets in addition to over 300 executive compensation
programs.
Mr. Van Epps oversees FPCM's Atlanta operations as well as manages the
technological resources and administration of FPCM including accounting,
financial reporting and audit controls. He also coordinates FPCM's insurance
strategies.
Mr. Van Epps earned a Bachelor's degree in Business Administration &
Finance from Georgia Southern University.
Richard F. Dolan
- Chief Financial Officer
Mr. Dolan brings over 20 years of
capital markets, structured finance, corporate finance, and M&A experience
to FPCM. Prior to helping found FPCM, Mr. Dolan founded First
Principles Finance, LLC, ("FPF") the predecessor firm of FPCM, in 2002.
Before he founded FPF, Mr. Dolan was a Managing Director at J. P. Morgan, where
he established and led the Insurance & Pension Derivatives business. This
business was consistently a market leader and provided structured high-quality
fixed-income strategies including synthetic Guaranteed Investment Contracts
(GICs), stable-value investments and structured fixed-income portfolios to
various institutional 401(k), pension, insurance and bank clients. Mr. Dolan
was also a trustee of the J. P. Morgan pension and welfare plans and was
responsible for the asset and liability management of the firm's non-qualified
employee benefit plans and their investments. In that capacity, he was
responsible for risk management and asset allocation, the purchase and
structuring of the firm's corporate-owned life insurance policies and employee
benefit liability design. Prior to founding J. P. Morgan's Insurance &
Pension Derivatives business, Mr. Dolan was a Vice President in the Mergers
& Acquisition group and taught in the firm's executive training programs.
Mr. Dolan received his Bachelor of Arts in Government from Franklin &
Marshall College, and his M.B.A. from Fordham University in New York City.
Jeanine M. Stampfl
- Controller
Ms. Stampfl has 18 years experience in
accounting, financial analysis and reporting, operational analysis, tax and
compliance. Prior to joining FPCM, she served as the Controller
for MDdatacor, Inc., a privately held healthcare information technology
company, where she managed the financial, accounting and human resource
operations. Ms. Stampfl also held finance and accounting leadership positions
at Johnson Controls, Inc., Vanstar, Inc., IBM, and Chase Manhattan Bank.
Ms. Stampfl earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Finance from Boston College
and her M.B.A. from Duke University.
Jack Branscomb
- FSA, Vice President and Director of Actuarial Services
Mr. Branscomb has more than 20 years in
life insurance actuarial consulting, specializing in the review and analysis of
insurance programs. Prior to joining FPCM, he was a consulting
actuary with Milliman, an international actuarial and consulting firm where Mr.
Branscomb was responsible for the development of COLI illustration systems and
the refinement of their associated products. He is currently responsible for
the development and support of several in-house analytical and audit systems
for FPCM's BOLI team.
Mr. Branscomb is a Fellow of the Society of Actuaries and a Member of the
American Academy of Actuaries. He graduated magna cum laude from the University
of Georgia prior to earning a Master of Actuarial Science degree at Georgia
State University.
Thomas Newkirk
- Senior Business Analyst
Mr. Newkirk has seven years experience
in institutional insurance strategies. As a senior business
analyst for financial institutions, he specializes in the design,
implementation, and administration of BOLI. His primary responsibilities
include client relationship management, marketing and business development, and
ongoing financial reporting, and investment modeling/analysis.
Mr. Newkirk earned his Bachelor of Science/Bachelor of Arts degree in Finance
and Risk Management at Appalachian State University.
Ryan Van Epps
- Business Analyst
Mr. Van Epps has three years experience
in institutional insurance strategies. Mr. Van Epps provides
design, implementation and enrollment support for BOLI transactions as well as
custom support on special projects. Mr. Van Epps received his Bachelor of
Science in Economics from the University of Tennessee.
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