CFALA 18th Annual Economic and Investments Forecast Dinner

MEMBERS-ONLY RECORDING

MODERATOR

Jane Wells | Jane Wells is an award-winning broadcast journalist with over 30 years experience in the news media. She’s covered everything from earthquakes to riots, from the O.J. Simpson trial to Mother Teresa’s funeral, from the massacre at Columbine to the 2008 financial collapse. She has questioned CEOs about poor business decisions, driven a bulldozer on live television, posed as a prostitute for a story on AIDS, appeared in the “Seinfeld” finale, and even got a hangover—on purpose—to test out the best cures.

Wells has won a Peabody and DuPont award for her part in KTTV’s live coverage of the Rodney King trial, along with several local news Emmys. In 2000, she transitioned from a career in general news to covering business and the markets for CNBC.

These days Jane remains a CNBC Special Correspondent, where she works on breaking news and special on-air stories. She is also the reporter for CNBC.com’s “Strange Success” franchise, and she regularly fills in at KFIAM640, the highest rated talk radio station in the west. In her free time, she produces story-telling promotional videos for non-profits like the Salvation Army. Back To Top ^^

PANELISTS

Heather Brilliant, CFA | Heather Brilliant serves as President and CEO for Diamond Hill Capital Management, Inc. Located in Columbus, Ohio, Diamond Hill is an investment management firm with $22 billion assets under management as of September 30, 2019. Prior to Diamond Hill, Heather was CEO, Americas for First State Investments.

From 2014 to 2017, she was CEO of Morningstar Australasia, where she led a team of approximately 150 financial services professionals based in Australia and New Zealand. Before assuming this role in 2014, Heather was Global Director of Equity and Corporate Credit Research at Morningstar for seven years.

Before joining Morningstar in 2003, Heather spent several years as an equity research analyst for boutique investment firms. She has covered a variety of sectors, including pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, business services, and retail. She started her finance career at Bank of America as a corporate finance analyst, covering the auto industry.

Heather has a Bachelor of Science in Economics from Northwestern University and a Master of Business Administration from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. She also holds the Chartered Financial Analyst ® designation and serves on the CFA Institute Board of Governors. She is the immediate past chair of the CFA Institute Board of Governors and is a past chair of the CFA Society of Chicago. Back To Top ^^

Sonal Desai, Ph.D. | Sonal Desai is Executive Vice President and Chief Investment Officer of the Franklin Templeton Fixed Income Group. In this role, Dr. Desai oversees Franklin's Municipal, Corporate Credit, Floating Rate Securitized, Multisector, Global (including Emerging Markets), Money Market, and Local Asset Management Fixed Income teams, and co-chairs the Group's Fixed Income Policy Committee. She is a member of Franklin Resources' Executive Committee, a small group of the company's top leaders responsible for shaping the firm's overall strategy. In addition, she serves on the firm's Management and Investment Committees.

Dr. Desai is also a portfolio manager for a number of strategies, including Core Plus, Strategic Income, Low Duration, Global Absolute Return, and Global Fixed income.

Dr. Desai joined Franklin Templeton Investments in 2009 from Thames River Capital in London. Previous to her current role, she served as a portfolio manager with Dr. Michael Hasenstab for the flagship Templeton Global Bond and Templeton Global Return strategies, as well as Director of Research for Templeton Global Macro, shaping the team's research agenda of in-depth global macroeconomic analysis covering thematic topics, regional and country analyses, and interest rate, currency and sovereign credit market outlooks. She started her career as an assistant professor of economics at the University of Pittsburgh, and then worked for over six years at the International Monetary Fund in Washington, DC. Following this, she joined the private financial sector and worked for about five years as director and senior economist for Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein in London.

Dr. Desai holds a Ph.D. in economics from Northwestern University and a B.A. in economics from Delhi University. She was part of the Templeton Global Bond Fund portfolio management team named Morningstar's Fixed Income Manager of the Year in Canada in 2013. Back To Top ^^

Matt Miller | Matt Miller is a political economist and corporate affairs advisor at Capital Group where his duties include analyzing U.S. policy trends that affect investment decisions, and supporting Capital’s communication and engagement efforts with a wide range of external audiences. He also hosts the firm’s new podcast, “Capital Ideas,” which features a blend of long-term investment insights from Capital’s team, and conversations with top authors and thinkers relevant to global finance. He has 33 years of industry experience and has been with Capital Group for four years.

Prior to joining Capital, Matt was a senior advisor at McKinsey & Company. Before that, he served as a senior advisor in the White House Office of Management and Budget and was a White House Fellow serving as a special assistant to the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. He was also a columnist for The Washington Post; the host of public radio’s “Left, Right & Center” program; and a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress. He has authored two books on public policy — The Two-Percent Solution: Fixing America’s Problems in Ways Liberals and Conservatives Can Love and The Tyranny of Dead Ideas — and has contributed to Fortune, Time, The New Republic and various other national publications.

He holds a law degree from Columbia Law School, where he was a James Kent scholar, and a bachelor’s degree in economics from Brown University, graduating magna cum laude. Matt is based in Los Angeles. Back To Top ^^

Please fill out your 2020 Economic Forecast Contest Ballot by February 7th, 2020 to have a chance to win a prize! The fillable PDF form contains instructions on how to mail and fax your ballot back to CFA Society Los Angeles, but you may also email your ballot back to us at info@cfala.org.