Cannabis: Insights and Opportunities

Cannabis could one day become a $4 billion a year market in the state of Illinois. In the state’s first month of legal cannabis, tax receipts have already reached $10 million. The medical and recreational cannabis markets are one of the fastest growing industries in...

SOFR: Life after LIBOR

What will life after LIBOR look like? On January 15, 2020, CFA Society Chicago held its event SOFR: Life After LIBOR, where a distinguished panel gathered to explain why the interest rate was going away and how potential alternatives are being developed. LIBOR has...

Distinguished Speaker Series: Curt Bailey, Related Midwest

Curt Bailey, president for Related Midwest, was the presenter at CFA Society Chicago’s last Distinguished Speaker Series luncheon on November 20th. Related is one of the nation’s largest property development firms and Bailey’s talk introduced the firm and gave an...

Vault Series: Counting Cards in Biotech

No EBITDA, no revenue, no product. What’s not to like? Despite being fraught with risk, investing in biotech stocks can be highly lucrative. Michael Caldwell, a portfolio manager at Driehaus Capital Management led a highly interactive discussion with a roomful of...

Opportunities in Hedge Funds in 2019

A distinguished panel gathered on October 10, 2019 at the Standard Club to discuss the current environment for hedge fund investments. Kenneth Heinz, president of Hedge Fund Research, Inc. served as the moderator. The panelists included: Kevin Doonan, Executive...

Big Data, Machine Learning & AI

Cathy O’Neil: Founder of ORCAA and Author of Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy Big Data, artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning are becoming some of the hottest topics in finance. A packed room of CFA...

Wine Tasting: Emerging Market Wines

The marvelous thing about tasting wine is that two people can split a bottle and experience something completely different, yet both opinions, shaped by each individual’s personal experiences, can still be valid. On April 30th, CFA Society Chicago took in an...

Curling at Kaiser Tiger

On a frosty evening where temperatures hovered just above ten degrees, CFA Society Chicago hosted an evening of curling and drinks at Kaiser Tiger, a bar with a large beer garden on Randolph Street. Curling, with origins dating back to 16th century Scotland, involves...

The New Networking

How should one define networking? It could be described as simply an exchange of information and services. But, according to Sameer Somal, a better definition that could lead to a very successful career could be “finding ways to give to others”.  “You have one of...

Vault Series: Cambridge Associates

Gender equality in the investment profession has been a hot topic in the industry lately, and it was addressed in detail during a January 10, 2019 Vault Series talk from Dierdre Nectow. Her firm Cambridge Associates, a large institutional investment consultant, is an...

Distinguished Speaker Series: Rick Waddell, Chairman of Northern Trust

Who better to teach management during a crisis than a former bank CEO who began his job in the midst of the 2008 recession? Rick Waddell has one of the most extensive resumes you’ll find in banking and dedicated his career to growing Northern Trust from a sleepy...

Distinguished Speaker Series: Ari Paul, CFA, BlockTower Capital

It was an inauspicious day for a cryptocurrency discussion. With many cryptocurrencies down by over 10% on August 8th, Ari Paul, CFA, CIO of BlockTower Capital, gave CFA charterholders a crash course in blockchain technology and the various cryptocurrencies available...

Distinguished Speaker Series: Jane Buchan, PAAMCO

The hedge fund industry has been assailed by the media as a costly, underperforming asset class, yet according to PAAMCO CEO Jane Buchan, that rhetoric simply isn’t true. On April 18th, the founder of the Irvine, CA-based hedge fund-of-funds presented to CFA Society...

Distinguished Speaker Series: Jeremy Grantham, GMO

Few encapsulate the time-honored principles of value investing as Jeremy Grantham, co-founder and chief investment strategist of Grantham, Mayo, & van Otterloo (GMO). On January 23, close to 400 attendees gathered at the Standard Club for CFA Society Chicago’s...

Four Tips to Launch a Successful Finance Career

If you’re just beginning your career in finance, you might feel your career path is defined; head down, work hard, and eventually the real career choices will present themselves down the road. This is of course true to an extent – the finance industry certainly...

Distinguished Speaker Series: Jean-Marie Eveillard, First Eagle Funds

Value investing makes sense; it works over time, so how come there are so few of us? On August 9th, CFA Society Chicago welcomed Jean-Marie Eveillard, senior investment adviser to First Eagle Funds, at the Chicago Club. The famed investor behind $110 billion First...

Investing in Innovation

  If you compare the list of Fortune 1000 companies from ten years ago to today, over 70% of its members have been replaced due to disruptive market forces and mergers and acquisitions. In the next ten years another large batch of less-innovative firms will...

Best Practices in Risk Management

                        What is risk? Many metrics and measures fall into the overall category of investment risk, including operational risk, market risk and credit risk. Investment risk is generally defined...

Distinguished Speaker Series: Tom Ricketts, CFA

After his family acquired the Cubs in 2009, Tom Ricketts, CFA, found the storied franchise in disarray. Despite not winning a World Series championship in over a hundred years, the team continued to pack fans into historic Wrigley Field. But with the 3rd highest...

Smart Beta: Smoke and Mirrors or the Next Generation of Investing?

Smart Beta – is it a bad fad or here to stay? On February 23, two panels set out to discuss that question at the University Club. Moderator Ben Johnson, CFA, Director of Morningstar’s global ETF research kicked off the discussion with a brief introduction into Smart...

Creating a Stronger Career by Building Your Personal Brand

Managing a brand comes down to two main points: How do others talk about you? And even more importantly: How do you talk about yourself? Executive coach and Make the Leap! Coaching founder, Curt Wang, brought powerful insight into how financial professionals can learn...

Distinguished Speakers Series: Kyle Bass

China has been in the news lately, and for all the wrong reasons. “A hard landing [in China] is practically unavoidable,” legendary hedge fund investor George Soros told Bloomberg while attending the annual World Economic Forum meeting in Davos. “I’m not expecting it,...

29TH ANNUAL DINNER

Financial speakers don’t come with a higher profile than billionaire Mohamed El-Erian, whose resume lists a staggering body of achievement: Chair of President Obama’s Global Development Council, Chief Economic Advisor at Allianz, former Co-CIO and CEO at PIMCO...

Next-Level LinkedIn Strategies

Is the resume becoming extinct?  JD Gershbein thinks it’s possible.  Every professional knows that it’s a good idea to have a LinkedIn profile, but how best to build it and find new opportunities?  Gershbein encourages professionals to continuously improve their...

Distinguished Speaker Series: Jeremy Siegel

Are stocks overvalued?  Not according to Chicago native Jeremy Siegel.  The Wharton professor and author often described as a “perma-bull” took a sanguine view towards the equity markets in his CFA Chicago presentation, saying that while stocks are the most volatile...