Dr. Yu (Ben) Meng currently serves as the director of Eight Sequoias LLC, an independent firm providing consulting services to the financial industry. He has two decades of experience working in the global finance industry across three continents. His career has been a systematic accumulation of product knowledge regarding all major asset classes through the various roles he has held on both the sell side and the buy side that culminated in his most recent roles as the DCIO at State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE) and CIO at California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS), which are, respectively, the largest asset owners in the world and in the US.
His holistic investment experience spans the gamut of investment dimensions. In geographic markets, he has worked in Asia, Europe and the US. In approach, he is a “Quantimental,” with both bottom-up and top-down experience that represents the perfect blend of quantitative and fundamental approaches. In investment horizon, he has a deep knowledge of fast money investment as well as experience with asset owners with decades-long time horizons. Finally, in managing pools of assets, he has been at the helm of two of the largest asset owners in the world and has applied his investment acumen and leadership skills to contribute to the success of these organizations. He is a leader with the highest level of integrity, with an approach of cohesive team building and the ability to positively influence an organization’s culture and financial performance.
In addition to his professional pursuits, Dr. Meng finds the time to actively engage with the academic community. He believes that great investment ideas often originate from the academic community. He serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Investment Management (JOIM) and frequently teaches at top business schools globally such as the Haas School of Business at the University of California at Berkeley, where he was the recipient of the 2014 Cheit Award of Excellence in Teaching.
Dr. Meng holds a Master of Financial Engineering degree from the Haas School of Business at University of California at Berkeley and a Ph.D. in Civil Engineering from the University of California at Davis.
