E328: Why Most Funds Get Rejected in the First Five Minutes

What if the best way to navigate credit markets is not about chasing yield but controlling risk? In this episode, I sit down with Danielle Poli, Co-Portfolio Manager of Global Credit at Oaktree, to explore how she manages a $20 billion portfolio within a $223 billion firm. Danielle shares how focusing on core income, rigorous underwriting, and a flexible toolkit allows her team to navigate complex markets while remaining defensive or opportunistic as conditions change.

What if the best venture returns come from managers no one else can access? In this episode, I sit down with Jorge Felippe, CEO of Almulla, a Dubai-based single family office, to explore how he builds high-conviction private markets portfolios while managing a multi-generational family and complex governance. Jorge shares why alignment, patience, and process matter more than flashy deals, and how a thoughtful approach to fund selection can capture early-stage alpha without the chaos of direct investing.

What if emerging markets aren’t a trap, but most investors just approach them wrong? In this episode, I sit down with Robert Koenigsberger, Founder and CIO of Gramercy, to explore how he has built a $7 billion emerging markets platform by focusing on high conviction, structured private credit, and long-term partnerships. After nearly four decades in emerging markets, Robert has pioneered strategies that capture the upside while managing risk, proving that careful underwriting, local knowledge, and disciplined execution outperform passive index approaches.

Will AI soon write investment memos, analyze deals, and run workflows inside investment firms? In this episode, I speak with Chaz, founder of Model ML, about the rise of agentic AI and how investment firms are beginning to automate complex workflows across private markets. Chaz explains how Model ML originally started as an internal tool built inside his family office to manage investments more efficiently — before evolving into a fast-growing AI platform used by asset managers, banks, and consulting firms. We discuss why chat-based AI tools have limitations for professional workflows, how firms can achieve major productivity gains through automation, and why the next phase of AI will shift from productivity toward generating investment insight.

What if the most compelling private equity opportunities aren’t brand-new deals, but the ones other investors have already “vetted” and are leaving on the table? In this episode, I sit down with Michael Woolhouse, Head of Continuation Vehicles at TPG Capital, to explore how he approaches the rapidly growing single asset continuation vehicle (CV) market—a space where sponsors can roll their most successful companies into new structures, creating liquidity while maintaining upside potential.

What does it take to build a world-class private equity portfolio for an 800-year-old institution? In this episode, I sit down with Sam Sturge, Head of Private Equity at the University of Cambridge endowment, to discuss how he rebuilt the program with a mandate to generate inflation plus 5% returns for generations. Before joining Cambridge, Sam worked at Morgan Stanley and Partners Capital, and today he oversees a concentrated portfolio of buyout and venture relationships within the university’s £4.5 billion endowment.

What changes when wealth stops being about building and starts being about preserving? In this episode, I sit down with Jonathan Dane, CIO and Founder of Defiant Capital, to explore how family offices think about portfolio construction after a major liquidity event. Drawing on his experience at Goldman Sachs and Jefferies, Jonathan explains why independent advice matters and how families navigate the transition from wealth creation to long-term preservation.

What if one of the most overlooked $700 billion pools of capital in the U.S. is quietly shaping private markets? In this episode, I sit down with Jennifer Mink, President of Investment Performance Services, an investment consulting firm overseeing roughly $70 billion in assets under advisement, to discuss how Taft-Hartley pension plans approach long-term investing. Jennifer shares how IPS designs portfolios that balance public and private markets, using disciplined asset allocation and diversification to improve overall portfolio efficiency and manage risk across market cycles.

Why are private markets still managed in spreadsheets when hundreds of billions of dollars are at stake? In this episode, I sit down with Ryan Eisenman, Co-Founder and CEO of Arch, a platform supporting more than 550 clients and over $405 billion in alternative assets. Arch is building an operating system for private markets that helps investors manage the operational complexity of alternatives across private equity, venture, hedge funds, credit, and more, bringing modern infrastructure to a part of the financial system that has historically relied on manual processes and fragmented data.

What if the best private equity opportunities are the ones no one else is set up to pursue? In this episode, I sit down with Jeff Collins, Founder and Managing Partner of Cloverlay, to explore how he built a $2 billion firm by going where capital isn’t. After 14 years at Morgan Stanley Investment Management, Jeff spun out to focus on what he calls “uncorrelated private assets” - niche, often overlooked segments where return dispersion is wide and operator selection matters more than financial engineering.