WILTON, CT, April 18, 2011 – Commonfund, a prominent institutional investment manager for endowments and foundations, pension funds and other sophisticated investors, today announced the appointment of David Belmont, CFA, as Chief Risk Officer of Commonfund Group. In this role Mr. Belmont will report directly to Verne O. Sedlacek, President and CEO of Commonfund Group and to the Audit and Risk Management Committee of the Commonfund Board of Trustees. Mr. Belmont will also serve as a member of the Commonfund Investment Policy and Asset Allocation Committee, and will have risk management oversight of all Commonfund investment programs.
“This is important news for Commonfund and our clients as we are able to hire somebody with David’s technical and practical skills and proven track record,” said Verne O. Sedlacek, President and CEO Commonfund Group. “His deep quantitative knowledge combined with his experience with leading institutional investors brings a wealth of knowledge to Commonfund and to our clients.”
Mr. Belmont will assume the leadership of an experienced team of Commonfund risk management professionals.
Mr. Belmont has over 17 years of successful institutional risk management experience. Before joining Commonfund, Mr. Belmont was Global Head of Hedge Fund Credit for UBS Investment Bank where he led a global team of 45 risk managers and analysts responsible for the risk management of hedge fund and managed fund exposures in the Investment Bank globally. In addition, he was Managing Director-Risk Management for UBS Prime Services where he led a team of eight risk managers responsible for the market, credit and operational risk management of the Prime Brokerage in the Americas. In both roles, he risk-managed exception transactions, set policy, designed risk systems and evaluated risk of hedge fund portfolios and was part of the senior management team responsible for maintaining relationships with key clients. He was a member of the UBS Prime Brokerage Executive Committee, the Exchange Traded Derivatives Risk Committee, the Prime Services Risk Committee and Prime Services Risk Board.
Prior to UBS, Mr. Belmont spent more than six years in Singapore with Temasek Holdings, Singapore’s $100 billion sovereign wealth fund, most recently as its Chief Risk Officer from 2004-2007. At Temasek, he evaluated risks of potential and ongoing investments, designed and implemented firm wide risk management and risk capital allocation systems, implemented stress testing protocols, portfolio modeling and capital budgeting. In addition, he was a Director with Anderson LLP and founded their Asia Financial and Commodity Risk Consulting practice in Singapore, managing a team of 17 professionals across Asia. He was also a Regional Risk Manager with Black River Asset Management, a multi-strategy hedge fund, and was a sovereign risk underwriter with Citicorp. He earned a B.A. from Bowdoin College cum laude and an M.B.A. and M.S. in International Relations from Yale University.
Founded in 1971, Commonfund is devoted to enhancing the financial resources of long-term investors including nonprofit institutions and pension funds through superior fund management, investment advice and treasury operations. Directly or through its subsidiaries—Commonfund Capital and Commonfund Asset Management Company— Commonfund manages over $26 billion for over 1,500 clients. Commonfund, together with its subsidiary companion organizations, offers more than 30 different investment programs. All securities are distributed through Commonfund Securities, Inc. For additional information about Commonfund, please visit
www.commonfund.org.