Ed F. Soccorso

Operates as a bank holding company

Piedmont Investment Advisors employs an objective and disciplined investment process that seeks to generate consistent excess returns over a full market cycle. The firm's risk-aware equity investment philosophy focuses on extracting alpha from three interconnected processes: Quantitative, Fundamental, and Macro. They believe that this combination offers the best opportunity to outperform in the long term and maximize the return per unit of risk for their clients. All of Piedmont’s equity products use this approach with each component used in varying degrees for each product. The firm's Strategic Core strategy is managed using a fundamental process but it utilizes quantitative models as a source of idea generation. Macro insights are taken into consideration in the process of portfolio construction. For their Market Plus, Optimized SMID Core and Optimized Small Cap Core, the quantitative models are the primary drivers of stock selection and portfolio construction while fundamental and macro insights are used as inputs for risk control in the portfolio construction process. Smart Beta products are managed using factor based weighting schemes. Piedmont’s Russell Top 200 Index strategy, S&P 500 Index Strategy and S&P 600 Index Strategy use full replication methodology to generate index like returns. Piedmont constructs customized, yield-advantaged fixed income portfolios with the expectation of outperformance over a full market cycle. Their yield-advantaged style seeks to dampen performance volatility by encompassing moderate duration shifts, strategically overweighting spread sectors, and being opportunistic along the yield curve. These objectives are synthesized and implemented within the context of a quantitative backdrop. Active management connotes a constant assessment of relative value, that is, whether expected returns are commensurate with the level of risk taken. Piedmont's bias is typically an overweight in the spread sectors. They construct well-diversified portfolios to give clients the broad benefit of owning these sectors while remaining mindful of not unduly exposing the portfolio to any one issue. Conversely, security selection is emphasized, but within the context of its overall risk versus expected return.

Blackstone Corporate invests in middle market companies located across the globe. The firm targets companies operating across a broad range of sectors and industries. It provides financing for buyout and growth stage capital requirements.

Functions as a College/University

Four Corners Capital Management (FCCM) employs a variety of strategies to implement investment they advice given to clients including: long-term purchases (securities held at least one year), short-term purchases (securities sold within one year), trading (securities sold within 30 days), or managing reference assets under total return swaps. In some instances, FCCM's clients may employ leveraging techniques in connection with their managed accounts. Generally in these instances, the portfolio managed by FCCM serves as collateral for the indebtedness incurred by the client. If appropriate and authorized by the client, FCCM may seek to minimize currency and interest rate risk through various hedging techniques. These hedging techniques may consist of investments in derivative instruments, such as forward foreign currency contracts, currency and interest rate options, currency and interest rate futures, currency and interest rate swaps and other techniques including financing of assets according to their unique currency and/or interest rate characteristics.

Functions as a College/University

State chartered commercial bank