Richard Walz - CCO, Cutwater Asset Management (LinkedIn)
Originally posted to LinkedIn on March, 2014
I managed Chris for nearly ten years while I was at Cutwater. Chris managed a team of five professionals with a broad spectrum of responsibilities. His team prepared accounting, reporting and reconciliations associated with fixed income assets, liabilities and derivatives related to an Asset/Liability Matching business as well as the investment portfolios of the two insurance subsidiaries of MBIA. Operationally, his group managed daily cash confirmation and settlements for over 1,000 swaps spanning multiple counterparties and currencies. His team was also responsible for providing accurate daily cash liquidity reporting to the internal portfolio management team.
Chris has a very strong aptitude in fixed income operations and accounting, financial reporting, treasury, GAAP, Sarbanes Oxley, project management, and information technology. He continually updates his knowledge of complex accounting and operational matters, and always ensures his staff is fully up to speed on technical issues. During the period of time I managed Chris the firm experienced a multi-fold expansion of fixed income assets along with the associated increase in liabilities and derivatives reaching a peak of $35 billion in assets. As the business grew, so did the complexity and type of transactions that were booked by the business. The growing volume of transactions required Chris to implement technological solutions to automate activities which greatly reduced the need to add new staff resources. These technology solutions were often developed directly by Chris and implemented into his team’s workflow resulting in improved data accuracy and faster turnaround times which accommodated increasingly aggressive financial reporting deadlines.
Chris is a very intelligent, team-oriented, thoughtful and talented individual. His accounting and operational knowledge combined with his computer, treasury, and project management skills make him unique among his peers. Chris not only understands the business and accounting issues facing many financial firms but he also knows how to manage the key underlying operational and technological tasks required to get to the correct end result.
I strongly recommend Chris for any new challenges in the financial industry and would be happy to speak with anyone to provide more insight.