John is Vice President of Equity Research. He joined CFRA in April 2019. He is responsible for fundamental equity research and analysis covering several segments within the Information Technology and Communication Services sectors, including enterprise software and SaaS/cloud providers, Internet advertising/social media platforms, and game developers.

Prior to joining CFRA, John co-founded Samadhi Capital Partners, an investment advisor and equity research firm where he developed an investment process and framework targeted at tech sector equities, with a particular emphasis on gauging the impact of and identifying the long-term winners from artificial intelligence, machine learning, deep learning, neural networks, and related developments categorized under the larger “cognification of software” mega-trend. Before his entrepreneurial stint, he served as Senior Analyst and Portfolio Manager at Sands Capital Management, responsible for the firm’s investments within the tech sector.

John began his career in equity research with an independent equity research firm, Precursor, where he was ranked as the top analyst covering network equipment stocks among independent research firms. He also spent the first dozen years of his career in various roles within the tech industry. During this time, he published dozens of white papers and research reports on topics ranging from network processors, Virtual LAN (VLAN) technology, and the historical evolution of enterprise application architecture.

John graduated from Harvard University with a BA in East Asian Studies.

Matthew is Vice President of Equity Research at CFRA. He is responsible for providing differentiated and actionable research and recommendations on equities in the Materials and Industrials sectors. Matthew’s areas of focus include: metals & mining, construction materials, containers & packaging, and building products. Matthew previously held the position of Industry/Equity Analyst at S&P Global Market Intelligence.

Matthew joined CFRA in 2016 and S&P Global in 2014, after working on the buy-side as an Equity Analyst at London Capital Management in London, Canada, where he covered North American stocks in the Energy and Consumer Staples sectors. Prior to joining the equity research industry, Matthew worked as a Financial Analyst for companies in both the retail and fitness areas.

Matthew holds his Bachelor of Business Administration degree from Colorado State University and his MBA from Concordia University in Montreal, Canada. He is also a CFA charterholder.

Paul Beland, CFA is the Deputy Director of Research at CFRA.
Before joining CFRA in 2017, he spent over 10 years working as a sell side equity research analyst with Citigroup and Lazard Capital Markets in New York City. He has covered Accounting and Valuation, Education Services, and Media. Previously, Paul led the TMT research team at ISS. He currently serves as a board member of the Global Regulatory Board of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors.
Paul earned a BA in Economics with honors and distinction from University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is also a CFA charterholder.

Sam Stovall is Chief Investment Strategist of U.S. Equity Strategy at CFRA. He serves as analyst, publisher and communicator of CFRA’s outlooks for the economy, market, and sectors. Sam is the Chairman of the CFRA Investment Policy Committee, where he focuses on market history and valuations, as well as industry momentum strategies. He is the author of The Standard & Poor’s Guide to Sector Investing and The Seven Rules of Wall Street. In addition, Sam writes a weekly investment piece, featured on CFRA’s MarketScope Advisor platform and his work is also found in the flagship weekly newsletter The Outlook.

Prior to joining S&P Global in 1989 and CFRA in 2016, Sam served as Editor In Chief at Argus Research, an independent investment research firm in New York City.

He holds an MBA in Finance from New York University and a B.A. in History/Education from Muhlenberg College, in Allentown, PA. He is a CFP® certificant and is a Trustee of the Securities Industry Institute®, the executive development program held annually at The Wharton School of The University of Pennsylvania.

Follow Sam on Twitter: @StovallCFRA

Giles Flower is head of global institutional sales, where he is responsible for the having the right team in place to reach our new business targets. This includes managing sales teams in North America, Europe and Asia, and ensuring they have strong pipelines to reach targets. In addition, Giles is responsible for managing his own sales territory in EMEA.
Prior to joining CFRA in 2011, Giles worked for 10 years on the sell side at Collins Stewart (now Canaccord Genuity) in sales and analyst roles within their Quest team.
Giles holds a Bachelors of Arts (Hons) degree from Kingston University, London.

Todd Rosenbluth is Senior Director of ETF and Mutual Fund Research at CFRA where he leads the firm’s holdings-based research efforts within the Equity Research and Fund group. Todd publishes regular thought leadership content on equity and fixed income products, maintains the quantitative fund models and supports client needs. He also serves as a member of Portfolio Strategy Committee and the Investment Policy Committee. Todd also held the position of Senior Director of ETF and Mutual Fund Research for S&P Global Market Intelligence.

Prior to joining CFRA, Todd previously served in other financial positions at S&P Global, such as International Mutual Fund Sector Specialist, Large Cap Value and Large Cap Growth Analyst and has served on the Fund Services Asset Allocation Committee. Prior to joining S&P Global in 2001, Todd was managing editor of Value Line Mutual Fund Survey and Senior Large Cap and Small Cap Value Mutual Fund Analyst. He was also a Financial Advisor with Morgan Stanley.

Todd holds a B.G.S in Finance from the University of Michigan and an MBA in Finance from New York University.

Follow Todd on Twitter at: @ToddCFRA

David Ibbeken is CFRA’s General Counsel overseeing the company’s legal, regulatory and compliance matters.
David joined CFRA in 2016 having previously served as Assistant General Counsel for S&P Global Market Intelligence, and as Senior Counsel for SNL Financial immediately prior thereto, where he handled a wide variety of legal matters.
David graduated from the University of Virginia with a BA in Economics and holds a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law.

Lindsey Bell is an Investment Strategist at CFRA. Along with the Chief Investment Officer, she determines CFRA’s asset class allocation and equity sector level recommendations. She participates in projecting the firm’s 12-month S&P 500 price target. Her market observations and sector opinions are expressed in regular writings on CFRA’s MarketScope Advisor (MSA) platform. She oversees CFRA’s portfolio management committee which manages five portfolios of stocks. Finally, she also assists in authoring monthly European and Asian Investment Policy Committee (IPC) notes, also available on MSA. She is a frequent guest on FoxBusiness, CNBC, Bloomberg and Yahoo! Finance, etc.

Prior to joining CFRA, Lindsey worked as an Investment Strategist with S&P Global within the Investment Advisory Services division. She worked in several different capacities at TheStreet.com before that, from helping to manage Jim Cramer’s small and mid-cap Charitable Trusts, to leading trader blog conversations and writing research. She learned the ropes as an equity research analyst at J.P Morgan and Deutsche Bank covering retail companies, and began her career in investment banking with Jefferies & Company’s Mergers & Acquisition group.

Follow Lindsey on Twitter: @LBellCFRA

Jennifer Latz leads CFRA’s Forensic Research team and serves as a Senior Analyst on CFRA’s European Forensic Research team while also leading the Consumer/Retail research team.
Prior to joining CFRA in 2011, Jennifer worked in the New York office of Ziff Brothers Investments for 5 years. Before ZBI, Jennifer performed financial due diligence for KPMG's Transaction Services Group.
Jennifer holds a Masters in Professional Accounting from the University of Texas at Austin, and a B.A. from the University of Michigan.

Tuna is Director & Industry Analyst at CFRA. He is responsible for general oversight of the firm’s Consumer sector strategy and recommendations by a team of equity analysts, for hundreds of securities. He covers companies in the Internet Retail universe such as Amazon and Netflix, as well as media companies such as CBS, Comcast and Disney. Tuna previously held a similar position at S&P Global Market Intelligence where he led a core team that created and implemented a proprietary S&P Core Earnings® framework, also serving on the firm’s Analytical Policy Board. He currently authors a biannual industry survey called “Media”.

Prior to joining CFRA and S&P Global, Tuna was a Senior Equity Analyst at Lehman Brothers, New York. He participated in key decisions by the firm’s Investment Policy Committee and was highly instrumental in managing a multi-capitalization equity portfolio, with primary focus on the Technology, Media and Telecom (TMT) sectors. Tuna also gained extensive global consulting experience in his previous roles at Arthur Andersen and KPMG.

Tuna earned an MBA in Finance from the Strathclyde University Business School in Scotland, U.K. He also holds a B.Sc. in Accounting from University of Nigeria as well as LL.B. (JD). Tuna is a CFA charterholder and a Certified Public Accountant (CPA).

Brendan McAuley is Head of Global Wealth Management Sales. He leads a global team of senior salespeople tasked with establishing and growing relationships with key Registered Investment Advisory and Wealth Management firms, Banks and Broker/Dealers.
Brendan joined CFRA in 2015 and previously lead the CFRA’s Institutional Account Management team in the US, and continues to manage some of the firm’s largest relationships. Prior to CFRA, Brendan was a Director of Institutional Research Sales at Oppenheimer & Company and an Institutional Relationship Manager at Dreyfus Funds.
Brendan holds his MBA from University of North Carolina Chapel Hill and his BA in from Sacred Heart University.

Lili Mehta is head of global marketing at CFRA, responsible for developing and executing strategies to build the company's brand, generate leads, identify opportunities to reach new market segments, and expand market share. Prior to joining CFRA in 2018, Lili served as Executive Director Of Marketing at Institutional Shareholder Services Inc. (ISS) where she designed and implemented marketing strategies and programs to increase market penetration across institutional investor market segments globally. Prior to serving in that role, Lili served as an independent marketing consultant for several large and high-profile B2B organizations, providing product and strategic marketing services under long term consulting engagements.

Lili graduated from Virginia Tech with a Bachelor of Science and holds an MBA from George Washington University.

Beth Piskora heads editorial operations for CFRA. She serves as the editorial director for CFRA’s MarketScope Advisor website, as well as CFRA publications like The Outlook (an investment-oriented website and weekly newsletter) and Industry Surveys (extensive reports on several dozen industries). Beth and the Editorial team review and vet all equity analyst-written content to ensure high-quality standards. In addition, Beth works closely with colleagues in Research, Technology, Sales & Marketing and Finance to brainstorm new content initiatives and bring them to fruition.
Earlier in her career, Beth was an award-winning business reporter/investing columnist for the New York Post, the oldest daily newspaper in the U.S. Beth started her editorial career as a reporter for the American Banker, a daily trade newspaper.
Beth holds a B.A. in Communications from The Pennsylvania State University.

Ishtmeet is the Vice President of Engineering at CFRA where he defines technology strategy and leads the application and infrastructure teams to build cutting edge tools for CFRA’s analysts.
Prior to joining CFRA in 2019, Ishtmeet has worked in various companies like Amazon, Capital One and Fannie Mae as Senior Technology executive. In his prior role as Vice President of Software Engineering at Gannett Co Inc, he led the digital content technology group. In this role he had overall responsibility for defining technology strategy and executing business alignment by delivering software solutions. This including an in-house SAAS content management solutions used by 100+ Gannett Newspapers across the nation. In addition to his prior company experiences, Ishtmeet also served as Captain in the Indian Army for six years.
Ishtmeet graduated from MGM College of Engineering in Nanded, India with BE in Computer Sciences and holds an MBA in Finance from Stern School of Business, New York University.

Chris Schenkkan is the head of Finance at CFRA, were he leads the company’s global financial affairs including statutory financial audits, budgeting/forecasting, tax compliance, monthly accounting closes, and accounts payable. Prior to joining CFRA in 2017, Chris was the Associate Director, Content Management at SNL Financial (now part of S&P Global) where he worked for twelve years to help the business scale to $250 million in revenues and over 3,000 employees.
Chris graduated from the University of Virginia with a BA in Economics and holds an MBA from the Darden School of Business, University of Virginia.

Will Suess is a senior quantitative analyst and head of the quantitative research for CFRA. Will joined CFRA in April 2018 after leading quantitative strategy for a Registered Investment Advisor and a Long-Short Equity Hedge Fund. Prior to that, Will served as a consultant to quantitative institutional investors to develop alpha and risk models. Will graduated from the University of Iowa with a B.B.A in Finance and Economics. Will is a CFA Charterholder.

Aniket Ullal is VP, ETF Data and Analytics for CFRA, one of the world’s largest providers of independent investment research. Aniket founded First Bridge Data, a leading source for global ETF data and analytics that was acquired by CFRA in August 2019. Prior to starting First Bridge, he had product management responsibility for S&P’s US indices, including the widely followed S&P 500 and S&P/Case-Shiller indices. These indices have over $1Trillion in ETF assets tracking them. Aniket is the author of 'ETF Investment Strategies' (McGraw-Hill; 2013). He is a graduate of Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management and the Indian Institute of Management in Ahmedabad.

Peter is the CEO at CFRA where he is responsible for the global strategic leadership of the firm. Peter acquired CFRA in March 2013. Previously he was Executive Managing Director at S&P Global. Prior to this role, Peter was Executive Director at Morgan Stanley and Vice President at JPMorgan where he helped develop leading Financial Technology investment banking practices. In addition, Peter was Vice President with LabMorgan, a JPMorgan venture capital division investing in financial information and technology companies. Peter graduated from Union College with a BA in Economics and holds an MBA in Finance and Entrepreneurial Management from The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.

Theresa is the CFO & COO at CFRA, leading the company’s global financial and operational affairs. Theresa was most recently the Senior Director of Finance, Corporate Controller for SNL Financial (now part of S&P Global) where she worked for approximately ten years in helping the business to scale to $250 million in revenues and over 3,000 employees. Prior to SNL Financial, she was Director of Business Management with LexisNexis and a Consulting Manager with Grant Thornton LLP. Theresa graduated from the University of Virginia with a BA in Mathematics and holds an MBA from the Raymond A. Mason School of Business, William & Mary.

Dan is the Chief Revenue Officer of CFRA where he oversees the company's global sales and marketing efforts. He has over 20 years of experience in sales management, team building and partner development including roles as the Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing at WealthEngine and CEO of GMI Ratings, an independent provider of global corporate governance, forensic accounting and ESG ratings and research. As CEO, Dan led the company to a successful exit for shareholders through a sale to strategic acquirer, MSCI, Inc. He also served as Executive Vice President of Sales & Marketing for Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) where he helped significantly increase revenues and actively participated in the sale to RiskMetrics Group (now part of MSCI, Inc.). Dan graduated from the University of Maryland and holds an MBA from Baruch College.

Zach is President at CFRA, overseeing the firm's intellectual property and client activities including research, analytics, data, client coverage, and marketing. He previously served as Global Head of Research at the company from 2015-2019 as well as Head of the Financial Institutions Research team. Prior to returning to CFRA in 2013, Zach was with Paulson & Co. and Paulson Europe where he covered financial institutions globally. He has worked in microfinance internationally and testified before the U.S. House and Senate on small business lending and development. Zach graduated from Brown University with BAs in Political Science and Italian Studies and holds an MBA from the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University. He is a CFA charterholder.

Eram is the CTO and Chief Product officer at CFRA where he defines product strategy and leads technology innovation leveraging his 15 years of experience delivering commercially profitable client-centered solutions. Prior to joining CFRA, Eram was Senior Director of Commercial Solutions at Fitch Solutions for buy and sell-side markets. As Global Head of Desktop Product Development, he developed the strategy and launched the flagship Fitch Connect Web and Excel platform that accounted for over $100M of revenue targeting counterparty credit and credit markets. Prior to Fitch, Eram held product development roles at S&P Global and other information services firms. Eram graduated from Washington University in Saint Louis with a BS in Marketing & Strategy and holds an MA in Cognitive Science from Teacher’s College, Columbia University.

Heather is the Global Head of Talent, driving Talent strategy and related matters across the globe. Heather was most recently the Senior Director of Human Resources at SNL Financial (now part of S&P Global) where she worked for approximately 19 years helping the business scale to $250 million in revenue and over 3,000 employees. Prior to filling the HR role at SNL, Heather worked as the Director of SNL’s Content Operations. Heather graduated from Mary Baldwin College with a BA in Business Administration.

David is CFRA’s General Counsel overseeing the company’s legal, regulatory and compliance matters. David served previously as Assistant General Counsel for S&P Global Market Intelligence, and as Senior Counsel for SNL Financial immediately prior thereto, where he handled a wide variety of legal matters. David graduated from the University of Virginia with a BA in Economics and holds a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law.

The diversity of views (both long and short) across the company, which drives prudent decisions free of bias. A rarity in our business.

That the delicate balance of skepticism, curiosity and conviction can often be rewarded if correctly executed.

What makes your days at CFRA different than other jobs you have had?
At CFRA, your opinions and suggestions go further, which was something I had not experienced when working at larger corporations.

You always hear how first impression is the most important one. When I joined CFRA some 18 months ago, it was in a midst of a large RFP in EMEA. We had extremely tight deadline and very complex proposal to make. I was new, nobody knew me and I needed a lot of support. I am still amazed how everyone came together to help. Every department pitched in and went for that famous extra mile to meet the deadline. Still today, there is not a one single person I could not reach out to if I need help. In essence, that is what makes CFRA special.

Independence. I am given the goals and know exactly how I’m measured, but I have the autonomy over my responsibilities and daily tasks.

Everyone shares the same values and is dedicated to the mission. Many companies talk about breaking down their silos, but here people do whatever it takes to get the job done – even if it’s not written in their job description. No egos, no politics. This is a first for me.

Having worked with a large multinational corporation for close to a decade, I can testify that CFRA feels a lot more close-knit, where what each and every individual does is important and plays a part in the overall direction of the business. As we continue to grow, I believe it is very important to maintain this aspect of who we are.

Even after being in research for close to 15 years, I'm happy to find that there will always be new things to learn on a daily basis, new ways of doing things, new challenges to tackle, whether strictly in research or in the day-to-day management of CFRA Malaysia.

I think the degree of freedom and flexibility in conducting research, coupled with the emphasis on integrity, performance and excellence, provides a healthy working environment which encourages collaboration, analytical rigor and a continuous drive for incremental improvement, while remaining cognizant of the need for work-life balance.

People…even though I don’t get to work with everyone in our office as we expand and offer more products, I truly feel we are all on the same team, working towards the same goal of keeping our clients first in all that we do, by collaborating with each other to produce the best quality products that add value to our clients.

Clients…Helping clients uncover risks in their investment decisions and thereby save money. It is really fun to uncover situations where management of public companies are trying to mislead investors.

People…I enjoy the work that I do, but more importantly I enjoy working and collaborating with our team.

There are numerous things, but one that stands out to me is the people. As a smaller company, everyone is willing to wear whatever hat is needed on any given day and do it well. I like the relaxed atmosphere combined with the fact that everyone is willing and able to buckle down when necessary. And, I think that’s embodied in our corporate culture where integrity and excellence are the expectation.

A couple items. First, I really am thankful to be able to apply my education directly into my work. That has not always been the case in my career. Second, I’ve really enjoyed leading the financial audit process across all of our entities with our external auditors. It’s been a great learning process and has allowed me to develop a keener understanding of our financials across the company.

I work more closely with the senior management team on a more consistent basis. The insight into corporate strategy, goals, and performance has been welcome from a knowledge, understanding, and alignment perspective.

Having flexibility at CFRA allows for creativity and idea generation. We get to explore deeper dimensions while conducting research and see the unseen. The freedom I have at work is exchanged with self-discipline and independence which allows me to be inventive.

I appreciate life-long learning, which the company provides. Whether it’s a small gesture or breaking headlines, you continuously get exposed and stay sensitive to diverse perspectives, in-depth understanding and vast amount of information. It is satisfying to connect the dots and make actionable conclusions, to maneuver through the ever-changing financial world.

There is no typical day here. It’s never the same and there are no rigid daily schedules to dictate what comes next. Inspiration and information come at anytime and anywhere and when it does, I let it sink in, and then I begin to filter and retrieve the essence. My highest responsibility is to meet my goals and deadline so that our clients receive that best independent research every time they read.

CFRA is independent and objective. We are not swayed by banking and trading relationships. Each analyst calls it like he/she sees it.

My favorite part of the job is authoring thematic research. I like to find novel applications to data pertaining to my coverage universe (retail, apparel, accessories & luxury goods) and to bring a more holistic approach to investment analysis.

A typical day starts out catching up on news for my coverage universe. From there, the days can diverge from updating models and authoring research notes reflecting breaking news events, to writing thematic research and Industry Surveys.

Employees take pride in their work and everyone has the opportunity for their voice to be heard. CFRA places emphasis on independence and integrity, keeping ethics at the forefront of the business.

Collaboration. The quantitative team is a close-knit group; we are always working together to improve our process. In addition to collaboration, my position gives me the leeway to explore an interesting topic and propose new methods to implement in our models.

The benefit of quantitative research is you don’t necessarily know where your day will end up. Whether it is exploring a new method or working to improve an old process, each day can hold something difference.

The people at CFRA are great to work with, and our research is unique.

Top of my list is people, but since I’ve already mentioned that, I’ll go with the close second of the entrepreneurial nature of the job.

Not really, and that’s something that I like too. Some activities happen daily, but many are client-focused or project-based, providing variation over time.

CFRA has a deeply-ingrained culture of independence, analytical rigor, and intellectual curiosity. Being part of that tradition is a privilege and is a reminder, every day, of the significance of our individual and collective efforts.

Taking on board all the different inputs to our analysis, drawing conclusions, and then communicating our views to clients.

The day begins with a review of our “firehose” inbox, consisting of legal filings and developments across the many lawsuits and regulatory matters we’re tracking. A Report or Alert is drafted and issued in the event of significant new developments. A portion of the day is devoted to new ideas or further research on existing situations under coverage. Perhaps the most important and gratifying component of our typical day is responding to client questions and building deeper relationships with clients.

Unique and impactful research.

Always learnings something new.

Mostly reading filings and associated documents.

CFRA has the best corporate culture I’ve experienced in my long career, and it cascades down from the CEO to all employees. There’s a pride and a tireless purpose to be the best, but never at the expense of integrity.

My favorite part of my job is heading analyst training. We host several training sessions each quarter on exciting topics like effective research writing, statistical analysis, valuation, and complex forensic accounting. And while we bring in external resources when needed, we have so many highly accomplished professionals and academics working at CFRA that enjoy cross-pollinating skills to other employees.

That’s a tough question. I think one of the reasons I’ve been working as a research analyst for nearly 20 years is that every day is different.