Speakers

Arthur Docters van Leeuwen

Mr Arthur Docters van Leeuwen (1945) is chairman of the board of Holland Financial Centre (“HFC”) since its foundation in 2007.  HFC develops initiatives that contribute to the continuation of a strong, open and internationally competitive financial sector (originated) in the Netherlands.

In addition to this, Docters van Leeuwen is Senior Research Fellow with the Netherlands School of Public Administration (“NSOB”).  The NSOB offers post-academic education for executives working in the public administration sector and acts a think-tank contributing to a high level of public administration in the Netherlands. From 1999 until October 2007,  Docters van Leeuwen was chairman of the board of the AFM, the Dutch entity responsible for regulating behaviour on the financial markets in the Netherlands. Besides being chairman of the AFM, he was chairman of The Committee of European Securities Regulators (“CESR”) from 2001 until February 2007. From 1995 until 1998 Docters van Leeuwen was chairman of the body of Procurators-General, and from 1988 until 1995 he was heading up the Dutch general intelligence and safety agency. In the seventies and eighties he held several positions within different government ministeries. He was for example from 1981 until 1988 deputy Director-General for Public Safety within the ministry of Domestic Affairs. Within that same ministry he was deputy director of the Dutch police. From 1970 until 1980 Docters van Leeuwen worked within the Inspection of the governemental finance departement. Docters van Leeuwen studied Dutch Law at the University of Utrecht, specializing in state - and administrative law.

Douglas Fore

Dr. Fore is the Director of Portfolio Analytics in the Asset Management Department at TIAA-CREF.  His current responsibilities include global investment strategy and strategic and tactical asset allocation; as well as quantitative analysis and modeling of investments. Personal research includes issues related to pension systems and lifelong financial security.  A particular topic of interest is the application of options-pricing methodology and dynamic models to analyze aspects of risk in defined benefit and defined contribution pension plans.  Dr. Fore has authored publications on public and private pension systems, as well as on the dynamics of income distribution and poverty around the world.  His most recent publication, co-authored with P. Brett Hammond, is, “Restructuring the Defined Benefit Pension,” in Restructuring Retirement Risks. Prior to joining TIAA-CREF in 1998, he worked in the Economics Directorate of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in Paris. He is a member of the National Academy of Social Insurance and the American Finance Association.

Dan Bergman

Dr. Dan Bergman joined AP3 in 2005 where he heads the Risk allocation team, working on investment strategy, ALM and allocation of alpha and beta risk.  The recent focus of the team has been the development of a portfolio of absolute return strategies including global tactical asset allocation.  Prior to joining AP3 Bergman worked as a senior strategist for AFA Insurance, primarily with asset allocation and ALM.  He holds a Ph.D. from Stockholm University and a CFA-charter.  He has published a number of articles in leading international journals and is a member of the Swedish Association of Financial Analysts.

Marjolein Sol

Marjolein Sol joined Mercer in 2007 as Business Leader Investment Consulting in the Netherlands. As such she is responsible for the advice given to more than 70 pension funds clients regarding ALM and/or investment strategy. Prior to Mercer she was with PGGM for seven years as Director Fixed Income, Treasury & Commodities and later as Director Equities. Previous to PGGM she spent more than six years with Rabobank International as head of Structured Derivatives and as head of Credit Derivatives. She started her career at the Treasury Research department of Postbank. Sol holds a master degree in econometrics (University of Amsterdam, 1989).

Tarek Saber

Tarek Saber (47), Joined ABP Investments in 2003 as Head of Corporate Opportunity Strategy. He is continually looking for ways to develop, contribute and initiate change through Innovation both within ABP and in the market place currently driving “Institutionalising of Synthetic Convertible Bonds” as an example. In the past Saber was involved in coordinating CDSs and Asset Swap drives and hedge fund initiatives within the organisations he was working at.

He started his career in manufacturing in 1982 and then switched into finance in early 1987 joining Prudential-Bache to focus on institutional facilitation, and specialising in derivatives and commodities. In 1991 he moved to NatWest joining their Convertible bond desk as a director responsible for all non US sales and Research. In 1996 he moved to Schroders Securities were he was responsible for trading, sales, research and proprietary trading in convertible bonds and GDRs. After the take over of Schroders by CitiBank, Saber moved to HSBC as Global head of convertibles with responsibility for operations in London, Paris, NY and  HK. Responsibilities included steering/advisory and credit committees, corporate finance advisory and client pitching at both HSBC and Schroders.

Mark Geene

Drs. Mark Geene RBA is since 2007 Senior Investment Manager Alternative Beta at PGGM Investments. Besides overlooking the FoHF-allocation, he is responsible for sourcing, due diligence and monitoring alternative risk premia.

Geene started his career in 1996 as a quantitative researcher at ABN AMRO Structured Asset Management. Later that year he joined OPTAS as portfolio manager equities. From 2000 until 2004 he was senior strategist at Blue Sky Group (KLM Pension Funds), responsible for ALM, SAA, risk budgeting and supporting the selection of external managers. With respect to SAA he has been working on the benefits of alternative investments (especially hedge funds), strategic use of derivatives and inflation linked bonds. In 2004 he moved to Fortis Investments (formerly MeesPierson) as senior hedge fund analyst and portfolio manager. Responsibilities included sourcing, due diligence and monitoring hedge funds and all related portfolio management activities. Geene has a masters degree in Business Economics (honours) from the University of Tilburg. He is a holder of the Dutch Certified Financial Analyst title, a teacher at different investment courses and started the Alternative Investment Committee of the Dutch Organization of Investment Professionals (VBA).

Panel

Jan Nijssen (chairman)

Jan Nijssen is an independent consultant and pension specialist with wide international expertise. With 25 years of experience in executive positions at Nationale Nederlanden and ING Group, where he served as Global Head Pensions and CEO Insurance Central Europe, Nijssen contributed to offering sustainable pension solutions in both mature and emerging markets. Nijssen, who studied econometrics, is currently general manager of Montae, a company that advises corporations, insurers, pension funds and trade unions on pension issues. He is also a fellow of Netspar, an institution that accumulates public and private sector pension expertise in the Netherlands. Nijssen is frequently consulted by government bodies and companies to share his wide international experience.

Jan Nijssen is an advocate of combining the core competencies of pension funds and insurers for profiling Dutch pension expience in international markets.

Peter Gortzak

Peter Gortzak (1958) is vice-chairman of the FNV union (1.1 mln members) since November 6, 2006. In addition he is general secretary of the foundation FNV. Specific focus areas of Gortzak include pensions, co-administration, labor legislation and cooperation with developing countries.

Peter has a prolonged career with labor union activities with more than 20 years with union work within the public sector, most recently as union secretary of Abvakabo FNV.

From 1983 until 1988 Gortzak was general and legal advisor within the ACOP (a cooperation between the public sector oriented Abvakabo and the education sector union Aob). From 1988 until 1993 he was governing board member of Abvakabo FNV. In 1993 Peter became board member of the Dutch police union NPB. In 2000 he re-joined the governing board of the Abvakabo FNV. With the FNV, to which Peter moved in September 2004, he became general secretary and CFO. When his colleague Ton Heerts left to take a seat in the Dutch House of Representatives, Gortzak exchanged his role of CFO into vice-chairman.

Philip Menco

Philip Menco (1956), who studied economics at the University of Amsterdam, has spent the first part of his professional life as investment analyst, strategist and board member at different investment banks. After 17 years on the sell side, he changed his position of chief strategist and head of research at ING Barings for a similar type of responsibility on the buy side at the ABP pension fund. Between 2000 and 2004, Menco worked as an independent consultant concentrating on the restructuring of the assets of several large Dutch pension funds, e.g. the metal workers pension fund PME. Also, he operated as an advisor to asset managers and pension funds. Mid 2004 he became CEO and CIO of De Eendragt pension fund, which he has transformed into a innovative life insurance company – De Eendragt Pensioen N.V. – in early 2006. Also, he has developed and implemented a sophisticated investment strategy.

Menco is member of the investment committee of another pension fund, participates in the Advisory Board of two international asset managers and is long-standing editor of the Dutch Financial Journal.

Pieter Wittenberg
Pieter Wittenberg (1947) has been involved since 1990 with the administration of what was formerly known as the postal & telegraph sector pension. After the restructuring in which Wittenberg was closely involved, he became part of the new management team of TKP Pension & Investments with responsibility for treasury and fixed income investments. Since 2006 Wittenberg is Head Fiduciary Management with TKP. His main responsibilities are designing the strategic portfolio for pension fund clients, advising them on innovative investment strategies and the implementation of their fiduciary investment management procedures.

Before joining the predecessor of TKP, Wittenberg held several capital market related functions. From 1988 until 1990 Wittenberg worked as managing partner/founder of ‘KBW Bemiddeling’ (joint-venture VSB and AMEV) where he was involved in the construction of financial architectures and turn key projects. From 1978 until 1988 Wittenberg was managing director and founder of Intercessie Nederland (broker in private placements). From 1969 until 1978 he worked with Haighton & Ruth as a FX broker and Euro-dollar trader, initiating Euro-dollar deposits trades in the Netherlands and was responsible for the capital market department. Wittenberg started his career in 1966 with Albert de Bary & Co. (now: Deutsche Bank) as a forex trader including currency arbitrage.

Theo Jeurissen

Theo Jeurissen (1948) is Chief Investment Officer since 2001 at the Pension Fund for the Metalworking and Mechanical Engineering sector (“PMT”). PMT is an industry-wide Dutch pension fund of the engineering and related technical sectors. It is the third largest pension fund in the Netherlands, with over a million participants and assets under management exceed €32 billion.

Jeurissen is responsible for the fund's investment policies and oversees the investments handled by PMT's management company.

He has been involved in the investment world for over 20 years. Before joining PMT, he worked in the investment department of ABP, the Dutch civil-service pension fund. As a member of ABP’s Board of Directors, he was responsible for equity management and investment policy development. He has also held several other posts, including Chairman of the Investors’ Committee of the Dutch Association of Industry-wide Pension Funds.

Wouter Pelser

Wouter Pelser (1968) is Chief Investment Officer at Mn Services and a member of the Board of Directors of Investment Management. He has worked with Mn Services since 2001. Prior he worked for Stichting Pensioenfonds HBG, where he was responsible as Deputy Director for asset management and pension affairs. In 1993 he started at insurance company Hooge Huys Verzekeringen N.V., where he worked for the Investments & Treasury department. In this function he was responsible, among other things, for the management of the fixed income portfolios. In 1992 he started his career at the Walgemoed Group after his study Economics at the University of Amsterdam. He also holds a certificate as Financial Analyst of the VBA course.

He is registered at the Dutch Securities Institute as Senior Asset Manager.

Chairman

Jeroen Tielman
Jeroen Tielman (1962), Chairman of the PensionSummit, joined Cordares as managing director Commerce, Strategy & Innovation on February 1, 2006. He started his career in 1986 with ABN AMRO as investment analyst and was a stockbroker with ABN AMRO Securities Inc. in New York between 1988 and 1992. After he returned to Amsterdam he joined the newly established global telecom industry team of the Corporate Finance / M&A department of ABN AMRO. Between 1996 and 2000 he was global head product development of ABN AMRO Asset Management. Jeroen resigned with ABN AMRO in 2000 to found FundPartners as an independent product engineering boutique for the financial sector, particularly the pension industry. PGGM was shareholder and launching customer. NIBC joined as shareholder in 2003 and fully acquired FundPartners in January 2005. As a consequence Jeroen joined NIBC as director pension business development. Jeroen completed his study business administration at the Erasmus University Rotterdam in 1986, is registered investment analyst (RBA) and member of the KPS. Since 2002 Jeroen organizes the annual PensionSummit as independent discussion platform for the Dutch and Belgian pension industry. From 2002 to 2004 Jeroen was member of the jury team of the IPE European DB/DC themed awards and in 2007 Jeroen participated in two seperate project adivsory teams for Holland Financial Centre.