Roger is an investment professional with over 4 decades of experience specializing in chain restaurants, franchisors and retailers. While financing, building and operating fifteen franchised fast casual (before there was “fast casual”) seafood restaurants in the late 1970s he returned to New York, and for the next 13 years (from 1980-1993) worked at Ladenburg, Thalmann & Co., Inc. where, in addition to his institutional research and sales activity, he sponsored an annual Restaurant Conference for investment professionals, featuring as keynote speakers friends such as Norman Brinker, Dave Thomas, Jim Collins (Sizzler & KFC), Jim Patterson (Long John Silver’s), Allan Karp (KarpReilly) and Ted Levitt (legendary Harvard Business School marketing professor, and author). Roger formed Lipton Financial Services, Inc. in 1993, to invest in restaurant and retail companies, as well as provide investment banking services. His website: www.rogerlipton.com was established in 2015 and today covers every publicly held restaurant company as well as selected non-restaurant franchisors. The Bottom Line: Roger Lipton is uniquely equipped as an investor, investment banker, board member or expert witness. He has studied great success stories, from McDonald’s to Panera’s to Shake Shack. Even more important he has watched scores of companies stumble and sometimes fail. His website. www.rogerlipton.com, is his platform for conversing with other professionals in the field, improving his own investment results, and remaining well informed on industry issues.

Doug brings a combination of decades’ worth of experience and successful navigation through some of the most turbulent periods in market history along with time-tested analytical skills, essential for looking past the current noise and herd mentality.

• Doug first achieved prominence – in the late 1990s – through strong performance as a dedicated short-seller and subsequently as a long/short manager. His views are often at variant with consensus.
• He is currently the President of Seabreeze Partners Management LLC, the General Partner of hedge fund, Seabreeze Capital Partners LP (formed in late 2021).
• Doug received his bachelor’s from Alfred University in three years. He delivered the commencement speech to the graduating class of 2010.  Doug received an Honorary Doctor of Humane Laws and was Vice Chairman of the University’s Investment Committee and a Member of the Board of Trustees. Kass received his MBA in Finance from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School in 1972 (graduating second in his class).
• While in his second year at Wharton, he co-authored “Citibank: The Ralph Nader Report” with Ralph Nader & the Center for the Study of Responsive Law. 
• Prior to founding Seabreeze, Doug was a portfolio manager and Director of Research at Omega Advisors.
• He was Director of Institutional Equities at JW Charles/CSG and First Albany.
• He was with Putnam Management (analyst and economist) and was a Partner at Glickenhaus & Co. 
• Doug began his career as a housing analyst at Kidder Peabody. 
• Companies continue to seek his guidance as a Director when faced with milestone events and/or seeking business alternatives
• Doug was a member of the Board of Directors of MVC Capital (NYSE) and is currently on the Board of Aspen Group (NASDAQ). He serves as a Board Observer for Twill Health. Previously he was a Director of Empire Resources, Federal Home Loan Bank of Palm Beach, Diversified Mortgage Group (the predecessor to Danaher) and from 2020-2022 he was a special advisor to the Board of Directors at Ocwen Financial. .
• Since 1997 Doug has been the principal contributor to TheStreet.com’s “Real Money Pro” (founded by Jim Cramer).
• He has been frequently interviewed by and written numerous articles for Barron’s (including several cover stories and five editorials), the New York Times and London Times. 
• Mr. Kass has lectured on short selling and economics at Harvard Business School, Tulane University, Florida Atlantic University’s College of Business and at Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management.  Since 2011 he has lectured in Dr. Robert Shiller’s Yale University Undergraduate and Graduate School of Management economics courses.
• From 2003-2016 Kass was a guest host of CNBC’s “Squawk Box” and appears monthly on Bloomberg’s “Market Surveillance” with Tom Keene and Paul Sweeney. 
• Kass was chosen by Warren Buffett to be the “credential bear” on Berkshire Hathaway – sitting on the dais at the company’s 2013 Annual Meeting for the purpose of asking questions of Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger over the course of Meeting.
• Author of “Doug Kass On the Market: A Life on TheStreet”  – a best selling book on investing.

Marko is a Partner and Chief Strategist at Clocktower Group, an alternative investment asset management firm based in Santa Monica, California. He leads the firm’s Strategy Team, providing bespoke research to clients and partners on geopolitics, macroeconomics, and markets.

Prior to joining the firm, Marko founded BCA Research’s Geopolitical Strategy practice (GPS) in 2012, the financial industry’s first dedicated political analysis investment strategy. The GPS service generated geopolitical alpha by identifying gaps between the market’s political expectations and the firm’s forecasts. Marko was a Senior Vice President and the firm’s Chief Geopolitical Strategist.

Marko began his career as a Senior Analyst at Stratfor, a global intelligence agency where he contributed to the firm’s global geopolitical strategy as well as its analyst recruitment and training program. In his academic work, he helped create the Center for European Union Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. Marko holds an MA in Political Science from the University of Texas at Austin and an MA from the University of British Columbia.

He is the author of Geopolitical Alpha: An Investment Framework for Predicting the Future, a book that introduces his constraints-based framework to investors. Born in Belgrade, Serbia, he has lived in Iraq, Jordan, Switzerland, Canada, and the U.S. When he isn’t writing research, you can find him coaching his kids’ basketball games or playing with locals on the neighborhood court.

Harley is an industry thought leader and commentator on macroeconomic issues spanning decades. He spent 26 years at Merrill Lynch where he created OPOSSMS, GNMA, PRESERV, MOVE, and hedge strategies for MBS servers.

From 2014 to 2017, Harley was an Executive VP and Portfolio Manager at PIMCO. In 2011, he joined Credit Suisse’s Global Rates. In 2006, he built the RateLab, a full spectrum US Rates Trading Desk Strategy Group.  In 2001, he became the manager of North American MBS and Structured Finance trading where he created SURF (Specialty Underwriting and Residential Finance).

Presently, Mr. Bassman is a Managing Partner at Simplify Asset Management. He continues to pen an episodic macroeconomic Commentary as well as manage a “hedge fund of one”. Harley has a B.A. in management science from the University of California, San Diego and an MBA in finance and marketing from the University of Chicago.

Liz Ann is Senior Vice President and Chief Investment Strategist at Charles Schwab. A keynote speaker at numerous industry conferences, Liz Ann is regularly quoted in financial publications including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Barron’s, and the Financial Times, and she appears as a regular guest on CNBC, Fox Business, CNN, and Bloomberg programs.

Liz Ann has been named “Best Market Strategist” by Kiplinger’s Personal Finance and one of SmartMoney magazine’s “Power 30.” Barron’s named her to the inaugural “100 Most Influential Women in Finance” list and Investment Advisor included her on the “IA 25,” its list of the 25 most important people in and around the financial advisory profession.

Byron Wien is Vice Chairman of Blackstone’s Private Wealth Solutions group where he acts as a senior adviser to both the Firm and its clients in analyzing economic, social and political trends to assess the direction of financial markets and thus help guide investment and strategic decisions.

Prior to joining Blackstone, Mr. Wien was Chief Investment Strategist for Pequot Capital and before that served for 21 years as Chief (later Senior) U.S. Investment Strategist at Morgan Stanley. In 1995, Mr. Wien co-authored a book with George Soros on the legendary investor’s life and philosophy, Soros on Soros – Staying Ahead of the Curve.

In 1998 he was named by First Call the most widely read analyst on Wall Street and in 2000 was ranked the No. 1 strategist by SmartMoney.com based on his market calls during that year. Mr. Wien was named to the 2004 Smart Money Power 30 list of Wall Street’s most influential investors, thinkers, enforcers, policy makers, players and market movers. He appeared in the “Thinker” category. In 2006, Mr. Wien was named by New York Magazine as one of the sixteen most influential people in Wall Street. The New York Society of Security Analysts (NYSSA) presented Mr. Wien with a lifetime achievement award in 2008. Mr. Wien received an AB with honors from Harvard College and an MBA with distinction from Harvard Business School. He is a member of the Investment Committees of Lincoln Center. He is a trustee of the New York Historical Society, and Chairman of the Investment Committee of the JPB Foundation.

Michael Wilson is the Chief Investment Officer and Chief US Equity Strategist for Morgan Stanley. As CIO and Chair of the Global Investment Committee, Mike is responsible for all investment and asset allocation advice provided to the Firm’s $4 trillion in retail-client assets. Over the past 30 years, Mike has held various roles with increasing responsibilities, mostly within Institutional Securities. He started his career in 1989 in Investment Banking, before transitioning to the Institutional Equities Division in 1995, where Mike created and managed the sector specialist team while serving as a Technology sector specialist himself. In 2009, he became Head of Content Distribution for North American Institutional Equities and then CIO for Morgan Stanley Wealth Management in 2012. He was made Chief US Equity Strategist in Research and CIO for Institutional Securities in February 2017. Mike is a regular guest on CNBC and Bloomberg and is often quoted in popular financial publications, such as Barron’s, the Wall Street Journal, and The Economist, and by various news services. He is on the operating committees of the Firm’s Wealth Management and Institutional Equities divisions. Mike holds a BBA from the University of Michigan and an MBA from the Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University.

Since the formation of Oaktree in 1995, Mr. Marks has been responsible for ensuring the firm’s adherence to its core investment philosophy; communicating closely with clients concerning products and strategies; and contributing his experience to big-picture decisions relating to investments and corporate direction. From 1985 until 1995, Mr. Marks led the groups at The TCW Group, Inc. that were responsible for investments in distressed debt, high yield bonds, and convertible securities. He was also Chief Investment Officer for Domestic Fixed Income at TCW. Previously, Mr. Marks was with Citicorp Investment Management for 16 years, where from 1978 to 1985 he was Vice President and senior portfolio manager in charge of convertible and high yield securities. Between 1969 and 1978, he was an equity research analyst and, subsequently, Citicorp’s Director of Research. Mr. Marks holds a B.S.Ec. degree cum laude from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania with a major in finance and an M.B.A. in accounting and marketing from the Booth School of Business of the University of Chicago, where he received the George Hay Brown Prize. He is a CFA® charterholder. Mr. Marks is an Emeritus Trustee and member of the Investment Committee at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He is a member of the Investment Committee of the Royal Drawing School and is Professor of Practice at King’s Business School (both in London). He serves on the Shanghai International Financial Advisory Council and the Advisory Board of Duke Kunshan University. He is an Emeritus Trustee of the University of Pennsylvania, where from 2000 to 2010 he chaired the Investment Board.

James Grant, financial journalist and historian, is the founder and editor of Grant’s Interest Rate Observer, a twice-monthly journal of the investment markets. His book, The Forgotten Depression, 1921: The Crash that Cured Itself, a history of America’s last governmentally unmedicated business-cycle downturn, won the 2015 Hayek Prize of the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research. His new book, Bagehot: The Life and Times of the Greatest Victorian, was published in July 2019.

Katie Stockton, CMT is Founder and Managing Partner of Fairlead Strategies, LLC, an independent research provider focused on technical analysis. Prior to forming Fairlead Strategies, Katie spent more than 20 years on Wall Street providing technical research and advice to institutional investors. Most recently, she served as Chief Technical Strategist for BTIG for four years, and prior to that Chief Market Technician at MKM Partners for nine years. She also worked for technical strategy teams at Morgan Stanley and Wit Soundview. Katie now provides research and consulting services to institutions and individuals as a registered investment advisor. Katie received her Chartered Market Technician (CMT®) designation in 2001, and later served as Vice President of the CMT Association from 2012 to 2016. In 2017, 2019, and 2020 she was honored by The Technical Analyst, a U.K. based publication, for her work. Katie graduated with honors from the University of Richmond and she now serves on the business school’s Executive Advisory Council. Ms. Stockton frequently shares her views on CNBC and other financial news networks.