Title: Director
Firm: UBS
Age: 33
Liberty Ziegahn dove into the public finance world when she took an internship with the Ohio Office of Budget and Management in debt management while working on her master’s in public administration at Ohio State University.
Liberty’s graduate thesis was an examination of the sale method on pricing for state general obligation bonds. During her tenure, she researched, analyzed, and monitored economic data, public policy literature and legislative proposals and served as the department liaison to other state agencies on capital needs.
Liberty, who is 33 and was named for John Stuart Mill’s “On Liberty,” transitioned to banking in 2010 joining William Blair & Co, lured by the opportunity to advance her career and to Chicago where her now husband was attending graduate school at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Liberty’s experience also includes a stint at Morgan Stanley. She joined UBS Financial Services Inc. as a director last year and says “it’s exciting” being part of a team tasked with contributing to the expansion of UBS’ public finance business since its decision to return to the sector.
Liberty is an Anchorage, Alaska native now firmly entrenched in the Midwest. She lives in Chicago with her husband DJ and their dogs, Wahya and Ozzie.
In her spare time, Liberty has transitioned from her competitive Division One soccer playing days to recreational leagues. She is on the board of the Chicago chapter of Women in Public Finance.
She has been “an invaluable part of our team in Chicago,” said Elizabeth Coolidge, managing director and head of the central region at UBS. “She was actually my client at the state of Ohio a number of years back and I have admired her professionalism since that time.”
