About

Prior to launching Director of Alternatives, I happily spent approximately 19 years aiding affluent families in the design and implementation of sophisticated investment and financial planning strategies.    

My investment experience began at Pillar Financial Advisors (PFA), where I worked in asset allocation and manager research.  I spent 7+ years in the Personal Financial Services group at PricewaterhouseCoopers, providing investment, tax and financial planning services to PE & VC investors, corporate executives, and private business owners.  I rejoined PFA (now Argent Wealth Management), to lead their internal due diligence and portfolio construction.  I then joined a team which was launching a new RIA - Twelve Points Wealth Management (TPWM).  My role at TPWM primarily centered around investments - manager selection and asset allocation, serving as a Director of Investments & Co-CIO.   

 I am a proud Double Falcon, having received a Bachelor of Science in Finance and a Master of Science in Personal Financial Planning from Bentley University (both with honors).  

I am a Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst (CAIA®), Certified Financial Planner (CFP®) and an Accredited Investment Fiduciary (AIF®).  

As my investment career progressed, I started to gravitate towards the (Alternative Investments heavy) "Endowment Approach" to portfolio construction.  I had exposure to Alternative Investments at every stop of my career, including working with clients who held 100+ Private Alternative Investments while at PwC,  but I especially expanded my work in this space at TPWM, guiding the firm towards a significant allocation.

 I find Alternative Investments intellectually interesting, and importantly, feel that a mix of these can provide improved absolute and risk-adjusted returns, over the (coming) full market cycle.  Furthermore, the diversity and quality of Alternative investment solutions available to the RIA/HNW channel has dramatically increased over the past 7-8 years (the time over which I have been very active in the space).   

Two of my prior roles involved managing my firm's relationship with Institutional Investment Consultants (Callan Associates & Asset Consulting Group), which provided both asset allocation and manager selection services (including Alternatives Research).   This set of experiences was profoundly informative. 

Given my prior experience, and since Alternative Investments (especially Private Asset Classes) are fairly new to the RIA/HNW space, I feel that I am uniquely positioned to design a consulting offering to help RIAs in all aspects of executing a thoughtful, comprehensive Alternatives program (inclusive of Tactical & Strategic Allocation and Manager Selection) - on a Part-Time Retainer Basis, for a Part-Time Price (a fraction of the cost of a full time Director of Alternatives, or an Institutional Consultant). 

My particular strengths are in Investments Due Diligence and Asset Allocation.  Operational Due Diligence and Legal/Structuring projects would likely need to be outsourced.  

Within Alternatives, I have a particularly strong background in: Registered Funds (Interval Funds, Tender Offer Funds, Non-Traded REITs, etc), Private Market LP Fund of Funds across all Private Asset Classes, a Core & Satellite approach to Private Equity/VC,  Secondaries  across all Private Asset Classes,  Niche/Esoteric/Uncorrelated Private Asset Classes, and Blockchain related investments.  

Born in Moldova, my family moved to the U.S. when I was in my teens, settling in CT, near New Haven. I moved to MA to attend college and, having met my wife at Bentley,  have remained there ever since.  We live in the Boston area with our 6 year old daughter.

I am a board member and serve on the investment committee of The Frederick E. Weber Charities, a 100+ year-old foundation that provides financial grants to social and human service organizations  serving low-income and disadvantaged families and individuals in the Boston area.

Outside of work and family, my main hobby is poker, though I do not get a chance to play much these days.   I played semi-professionally in my 20's, having won over 150 poker tournaments in 8 different poker variations, averaging an ROI of 30%+ over a sample size of approximately 10,000 tournaments.

I have a passion for travel, am a bit of a foodie, and enjoy rooting for Boston sport teams, especially Patriots and Celtics.