Former banker involved in munis joins Treasury

WASHINGTON – Bradley Wendt, a former capital markets consultant and investment banker who helped launch innovative insurance and electronic trading startups, has joined the Treasury Department as a senior adviser in its Office of Domestic Finance.

Wendt declined to comment on his new post after the agenda for an upcoming municipal finance conference listed him as a Treasury official.

But sources said the Office of Domestic Finance, which currently is lacking a Senate-confirmed undersecretary, provides advice on domestic finance, banking, and related economic matters. It also develops policies and guidance for Treasury activities involving financial institutions, federal debt finance, financial regulations and capital markets.

treasury-dept-bldg
U.S. Treasury Department Building

Before joining Treasury, Wendt was most recently a senior consultant at Charles River Associates in New York City. He joined the global firm in January 2014, where he was involved with many capital market and wealth management issues for more than four years.

Prior to that, from February 2009 to December 2013, he was president of the The BondFactor Company, which he co-founded and which invented a patented financial model for insuring municipal bonds. He also formed and directed a partnership to create a proprietary net asset value pricing engine for investment grade municipal bonds based on Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board data and primary market new originations, according to his LinkedIn site. The company had trouble raising capital and it no longer exists, according to press reports.

From January 2001 to March 2006 he was co-founder, president and chief operating officer of BondDesk Group LLC, an alternative trading system that is now a part of Tradeweb Direct, a division of Tradeweb Markets LLC.

Wendt was a managing director at Goldman Sachs from April 1990 through December 2000, while the current Treasury secretary, Steven Mnuchin, was rising through the ranks at the firm.

Wendt created and ran Goldman’s municipal capital markets group specializing in interest rate swaps, options, structured products, credit arbitrage, portfolio optimization, variable-rate note products and new issue structuring and origination. Mnuchin started at Goldman in 1985 after he graduated from Yale University. He became head of its mortgage securities department in November 1994, and in late 1998 began overseeing mortgages, U.S. governments, money markets, municipals in the fixed income, currency and commodities division. Mnuchin continued to be promoted to several executive positions at the firm until he left in 2002.

Before joining Goldman, Wendt was a director at Merrill Lynch from July 1984 to March 1990. He was a founding member of the firm’s business unit that helped create the municipal interest rate swap market.

Wendt received MBAs from Dartmouth College’s Tuck School of Business and the University of Colorado at Boulder in 1984 and 1982, respectively. He obtained a BA in management from the U.S. Air Force Academy in 1977.

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Munis Finance Insurance Capital markets Fixed income Steven Mnuchin Treasury Department Goldman Sachs Merrill Lynch Washington DC
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