NewOak Capital hired Wendy Berry and Shelley Michelson as directors in its fundamental credit group
Both Berry and Michelson will be senior members of the team, reporting to the group's co-heads, Chris Foster and Triet Nguyen, the company said Wednesday. They will help in building out NewOak's corporate and municipal credit capabilities and assisting clients in fundamental credit assessment, surveillance and portfolio monitoring, the company said.
"We're very excited to have such seasoned credit professionals as Wendy and Shelley join NewOak," Foster and Nguyen said in the statement. "Each is a widely recognized and respected expert in her respective sector and will add even more analytical depth to our team as we grow our fundamental credit advisory services. We look forward to Wendy and Shelley's contributions to the development of pioneering municipal risk management solutions for our clients."
Berry will be NewOak's education sector head, where she brings over 25 years of public finance experience. Before joining NewOak, Berry was focused on the evolving charter school sector where she has been a thought leader in improving credit standards for the burgeoning market.
Her past experience includes positions with Charter School Advisors, where she served as a Securities and Exchange Commission/Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board-registered Financial Advisor to charter schools; Jefferies & Co., where she was an investment banker focusing on higher education and charter school credits; and Moody's Investors Service, where her 16 year tenure included assignments that focused on higher education, housing, school districts and student loans
"I am thrilled to join NewOak's credit team and be a part of the firm's unique analytical platform," said Berry. "I look forward to integrating fundamental credit analysis with industry-advanced technology to greatly enhance credit and surveillance efforts for our clients."
Michelson will be NewOak's health care sector head. She brings over 30 years of experience in municipal credit experience in new business development and portfolio risk management at several monoline bond insurance companies and in the government guaranteed sector at a major issuer of FHA/GNMA securities.
She was most recently principal and founder of Healthcare Analytics, LLC, a firm providing consulting services to portfolio managers and healthcare mortgage banking firms, including healthcare metrics and data sources as well as credit analysis of new issues and existing portfolios for municipal portfolio managers and healthcare mortgage banking firms.
Previously, Michelson generated the then largest-ever premium for a new hospital transaction at Ambac, managed a $7.6 billion hospital portfolio at Assured Guaranty and a $3.8 billion government insured/guaranteed hospital portfolio at Prudential Huntoon Paige Associates, Ltd., where she was responsible for the largest hospital production in the firm's history.
"NewOak's business model contains a host of innovative, forward-looking and customizable financial tools that can be applied to fundamental credit analysis in every bond sector," Michelson said. "I'm excited to be part of this team of professionals and look forward to contributing to the development of these applications."
