Team

William R. “Bill” Kennedy, Jr. is a Founder, Chief Executive Officer, and Chief Investment Officer of RiskBridge. He oversees and is responsible for the firm’s investment decisions and strategic course. RiskBridge’s risk-aware philosophy and research-driven competitive edge reflects Bill’s thirty-plus years of experience in capital market research, asset allocation, portfolio construction, and risk management.

Prior to founding RiskBridge, Bill was the Chief Investment Officer at Fieldpoint Private where he advised $4.5 billion in client assets. He also served as the Global Director of Research for Citi and was appointed to Citi’s Management Committee and Global Wealth Management Planning Committee and worked in New York and Tokyo. Bill began his investment career in 1992 at the DuPont Pension Fund as an Asset Allocation Analyst and Portfolio Manager.

Bill has served on several boards of education, humanitarian, and religious organizations. He currently serves as Chairman of the Global Interdependence Center, a leading institution exploring global economic policy trends impacting economies and living standards. Bill is a member of The Economic Club of New York and the CFA Society of New York. He earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Texas Christian University.

Molly Burba joined RiskBridge Advisors, LLC in 2021. Molly has 19 years of finance experience, including 14 focused on alternative investment analysis with research, portfolio, and client-facing responsibilities.

Molly is primarily responsible for active manager selection, including hedge funds, private equity, real assets, and special opportunities. She serves as a voting member on the RiskBridge Investment Committee, which is directly responsible for the firm’s asset allocation strategies and selecting investment managers for client portfolios.

Before joining RiskBridge, Ms. Burba held senior roles at Seven Bridges Advisors, MAN Group, and Fortis Bank. She began her career at Robert W. Baird & Co., Inc. Molly earned a BA in Economics from Vanderbilt University and an MBA in finance from Columbia Business School.

Josh Kaufman joined RiskBridge Advisors, LLC in 2020. Josh has five years of experience in quantitative analysis, exchange-traded fund research, and portfolio construction.

Josh is primarily responsible for portfolio management, including asset allocation, trading, and portfolio design and implementation. Josh is involved in active manager selection, including traditional equity and fixed income strategies, and passive (ETF) strategy selection. Josh serves as the lead Investment Analyst for the firm’s flagship Managed Volatility Portfolios (MVPs). His expertise includes capital market research, technical analysis, and due diligence of sub-advisors and underlying funds.

Prior to joining RiskBridge, Josh was a Quantitative Analyst at Fieldpoint Private. Josh earned a BS in economics and a BBA in finance from Pace University. Josh is a certified Chartered Market Technician (CMT). He is based in Connecticut.

David R. Kotok cofounded Cumberland Advisors in 1973 and has been its Chief Investment Officer since inception. He holds a B.S. in economics from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, an M.S. in organizational dynamics from The School of Arts and Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania, and an M.A. in philosophy from the University of Pennsylvania.

Mr. Kotok’s articles and financial market commentaries have appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Barron’s, and other publications. He is a frequent guest on Bloomberg TV and Bloomberg Radio, Yahoo Finance TV, and other media.

Mr. Kotok has served as Program Chairman and currently serves as a Director of the Global Interdependence Center (GIC), www.interdependence.org, whose mission is to encourage the expansion of global dialogue and free trade in order to improve cooperation and understanding among nation states, with the goal of reducing international conflicts and improving worldwide living standards. Mr. Kotok chaired its Central Banking Series and organized a five-continent dialogue held in Cape Town, Chile, Hong Kong, Hanoi, Milan, Paris, Philadelphia, Prague, Rome, Santiago, Shanghai, Singapore, Tallinn, and Zambia (Livingstone). He has received the Global Citizen Award from GIC for his efforts.

Mr. Kotok is a member of the National Business Economics Issues Council (NBEIC), the National Association for Business Economics (NABE) and served on the Research Advisory Board of BCA Research. Mr. Kotok serves as a member of the advisory board of RiskBridge Advisors, an outsourced chief investment officer (OCIO) firm serving nonprofit endowments and foundations, financial institutions, and family offices. Mr. Kotok has served as a Commissioner of the Delaware River Port Authority (DRPA) and on the Treasury Transition Teams for New Jersey Governors Kean and Whitman. He has also served as a board member of the New Jersey Economic Development Authority and as Chairman of the New Jersey Casino Reinvestment Development Authority. He has authored or co-authored four books, including the second editions of From Bear to Bull with ETFs and Adventures in Muniland. David has also written the monograph pamphlet, “Thucydides” detailing information asymmetries & their implications for investors and world affairs.

Esme Miano was promoted to the Investment Analyst position in 2023, having joined RiskBridge Advisors, LLC in  2021. Her educational and work experience has allowed her to develop expertise in manager research, private fund operations, portfolio construction, client service, and marketing.

In her role, Esme focuses on all facets of fixed income markets, including rates, credit, and spread products. She oversees research, due diligence, and reporting for all active and passive fixed income strategies selected to the RiskBridge approved manager list. In addition, Esme leads our private placement subscription efforts and assists with client service functions for institutional and individual clients.

Esme earned her Bachelor of Science from Fairfield University’s Dolan School of Business, where she majored in finance.

Dana M. Peterson is the Chief Economist and Leader of the Economy, Strategy & Finance Center at The Conference Board. Prior to this, she served as a North America Economist and later as a Global Economist at Citi, the world’s largest investment bank. Her wealth of experience extends to the public sector, having also worked at the Federal Reserve Board in Washington, D.C.

Dana’s wide-ranging economics portfolio includes analyzing global themes having direct financial market implications, including monetary policy; inflation; labor markets; fiscal and trade policy; debt; taxation; ESG; consumption, and demographics. Her work also examines myriad U.S. themes leveraging granular data.

Peterson’s research has been featured by U.S. and international news outlets, both in print and broadcast. Publications and networks include CNBC, FOX Business, Bloomberg, Thomson-Reuters, CNN Finance, Yahoo Finance, TD Ameritrade, Barron’s, the Financial Times, and the Wall Street Journal.

She is member of the Board of Directors of NBER, NABE, and the Global Interdependence Center, President of the New York Association for Business Economics (NYABE), and a member of NBEIC, the Forecasters Club, and the Council on Foreign Relations.

She received an undergraduate degree in Economics from Wesleyan University and a Master of Science degree in Economics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

As Chair of the Advisory Board, Mr. Pfeiffer serves in a part-time, non-executive capacity advising RiskBridge on strategy and business development opportunities in the turnkey asset management platform (TAMP) and registered investment advisors (RIA) space.

Mr. Pfeiffer has served as the President and CEO of the Money Management Institute since 2015. Pursuing a passion to elevate the professionalism of the industry, he founded Advisors Ahead LLC in 2012. Additionally, he is a board director for Westfield’s Ohio Farmers Insurance Company and serves as an operating partner at Corsair Capital. Previously, he served as the Executive Chairman for Inlet, a joint venture between Broadridge and Pitney Bowes that was successfully sold to a strategic buyer.

Mr. Pfeiffer is a senior financial services executive with 40 years of industry experience. He spent 29 years with Morgan Stanley Smith Barney (MSSB) and its predecessor firms. He transitioned in 2012 where he was Vice Chairman and on the Executive Committee. From 2003 to 2011, he held senior positions including the national sales group, marketing strategy and client communications, desktop technology, and brokerage-based banking. Additionally, he was responsible for the retirement services and corporate equity solutions businesses. From 1980 to 2003, Mr. Pfeiffer started as a FA and progressed through all levels of field management. Mr. Pfeiffer is an alumnus of Indiana University Kelley School of Business and currently serves on the Dean’s Council.

Jim Scanlon joined RiskBridge in 2024. He has 27 years of experience in asset management sales, marketing, and management roles.

Jim is primarily responsible for marketing and distributing RiskBridge’s custom and Managed Volatility Portfolio (MVP) models to the independent RIA and TAMP model marketplace.

Before joining RiskBridge, Jim was head of sales and relationship management for Lear Investment Management. Previous roles include head of distribution at Gamco Investors, institutional and advisory sales at Merrill Lynch, and various sales and client service roles at Putnam Investments. He began his Wall Street career selling investment research for Thomson Financial. Jim earned his BA in Economics from Western New England University and lives in the Boston area with his two children.

Nishi Shah, CFA, is a Director, Public Investments at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

Previously, Nishi spent nine years as a Founding Partner and the Head of Research of Old Farm Partners, where she led hedge fund and co-investment selection and helped grow the firm to over $650 million in AUM.

Prior to that, Nishi spent nine years at Soros Fund Management where she was a Senior Analyst on the External Manager team, an Equity Research Analyst and a Legal Analyst.

Ms. Shah graduated magna cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania with a BA with honors in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics, and minors in Architecture and Environmental Studies. She has been a CFA Charterholder since 2017 and serves on the Northstar Fund community foundation.

Clay Skurdal joined RiskBridge Advisors, LLC, in 2021. Clay has 40 years of experience advising High-Net-Worth families on all aspects of their wealth, estate, and investment planning.

Clay offers an extraordinary depth of service to a deliberately limited clientele, working with families to craft highly custom, meticulously diversified portfolios. As a matter of personal philosophy, he sits on the same side of the table with his clients in an unconflicted advisory capacity. Clay advises on wealth transfer and philanthropic planning, pre-liquidity planning for entrepreneurs, and banking and credit strategies. Clay serves as a voting member on the RiskBridge Investment Committee.

Prior to joining RiskBridge, Clay spent many years with Morgan Stanley/Smith Barney and predecessor firms, in his last assignment in the Pacific Northwest overseeing 100 advisors managing over $7 billion in client assets. Clay earned a BS from Montana State University and holds his CEPA® (Certified Exit Planning Advisor) designation.

Estelle Stedman joined RiskBridge Advisors, LLC in 2023.

In her role, Estelle focuses on all facets of client experience, and is passionate about client services and investor support, marketing and communications, and proposal preparation.

Estelle earned her BA in English from Dartmouth College.

Phil Strassler, through Strassler, LLC, consults with families of wealth and single-family offices on strategy, successful business practices, and building sustainable Family Investment Offices. Since 2008 he has been instrumental in creating and staffing some of the largest SFOs on the East Coast. Phil leads the Family Office Division of JSB Partners. He is the former Chair of the Family Office Committee of the New York State Society of CPAs and former Director of Fieldpoint Private Bank. In addition to his consulting group, Phil is a founder of the Larry Kraus Tax Institute for Family Offices, which develops programs that provide Single Family Offices with an understanding of relevant tax issues.

In 2007, he retired as a Partner at Marcum & Kliegman LLP, where he was instrumental in fueling the firm’s growth from $20 million in revenues with 30 professionals, to nearly $120 million with 500 professionals by the time he left to launch Strassler, LLC.

At Marcum & Kliegman LLP he founded and was the leader of the Private Wealth Services and Alternative Investment Group practices. From 2008 – 2010 Phil developed and taught the Emerging Leadership Program to Marcum & Kliegman LLP Senior Managers and Partners.

Prior to joining Marcum & Kliegman LLP, Phil was a Partner at a billion-dollar mezzanine/leveraged buyout fund. In this capacity, he provided investment analysis and tax advice. Phil also spent ten years working on tax, business advice and investment analysis for a single-family office.

On an ongoing basis, Phil speaks on hedge fund, investment partnership and family office organization and tax planning and has written numerous articles for The Tax Advisor, The CPA Journal, The Journal of Practical Estate Planning, as well as other publications. During his tenure at Marcum & Kliegman LLC, he was the Publisher of Private Investment Forum, Marcum & Kliegman LLP’s quarterly publication directed at hedge funds and investment partnerships.

Phil is a member of the AICPA and NYSSCPA and is a member of the NYSSCPA Taxation of Financial Instruments and Transactions and Family Office Committees. Phil has a B.B.A. from Hofstra University and lives in Wellington, Florida and Roslyn Heights, New York.

Jamie Wells joined RiskBridge Advisors, LLC in 2024.

As the Operations Manager, Jamie works closely with all aspects of the firm’s operations including human resources, business operations, technology, process implementation & project management.

Prior to joining RiskBridge, Jamie was the Operations Manager of a broker dealer and has family office experience.  Jamie received her BA in Business Administration from Baruch College and has a Black Belt in Six Sigma.