Irish America Magazine

Irish America Magazine celebrated its brightest stars on Monday, December 16th at the Annual Business 100 Awards Gala, which honored exceptional Irish-American and Irish-born leaders who are transforming the global business world. The awards, celebrated at the beautiful Metropolitan Club, brought together over 60 of the 100 honorees representing some of the world’s most innovative and influential companies. We were honored to be joined for the evening by Deputy Secretary General of the Department of Foreign Affairs, Ireland of Foreign Affairs Sonja Hyland, and Helena Nolan, Consul General of Ireland in New York for the evening. Helen Doody, Managing Director of Abbey Capital (US), and Brian A. Ruane, Senior Executive Vice President of BNY, delivered empowering keynote speeches that motivated and inspired everyone present. The atmosphere was electric as guests connected, shared stories, and celebrated their heritage and accomplishments. It was a night to remember, filled with Irish pride and admiration for these remarkable leaders. Congratulations to all of the 2024 Business 100 honorees!

Congratulations to returning Wall Street 50 honoree and 2022 keynote speaker Ronan Ryan. Ronan Ryan is the Chief Operating Officer and Co-founder of IEX, a fair, simple & transparent equity trading organization. A graduate of Fairfield University, Ronan has over 20 years of experience in networking infrastructure. He was the head of Financial Services Development at Switch and Data before moving to RBC Capital Markets, where he became head of Electronic Trading Strategy and was instrumental in developing THOR, RBC’s award-winning trading technology. A native of Dublin, Ronan moved to America in 1990 at age 16 and credits a lot of his business initiative to his Irish heritage. He says, “to be Irish is to be innovative.” In 2014, he and IEX made global headlines when they were featured prominently in Michael Lewis’s best-seller Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt. In 2015, IEX continued to grow its market share and became the 3rd largest alternative trading system in the United States. In addition to leading IEX, Ronan has taken on the role of U.S. Chairman for GOAL Global, an international humanitarian response agency that was founded in Ireland over 40 years ago. Ronan and his wife Kara live in New Jersey and have two children, Emma and Jack. https://lnkd.in/e4U5bMER

Congratulations to first-time Wall Street 50 honoree Brian Mulcahy. Brian Mulcahy serves as the CEO of StoneX Digital (US) and StoneX Digital International Limited (Ireland) divisions of StoneX Group, a global financial services firm. In this role, Brian is spearheading the integration of digital assets into StoneX’s offerings, positioning the firm to meet the evolving demands of its worldwide investor base. Before joining StoneX, Brian was the Chief Revenue Officer for ED&F Man Capital markets until December 2020. Brian also served as Founder and Chief Operating Officer of MPS Global Securities, a firm he co-founded in 2010, which was later purchased by ED&F Man. Brian’s Irish heritage reflects a rich legacy, with his ancestors emigrating from Carlow, Cork, and Wicklow to New York’s Lower East Side and Brooklyn in the late 1800s. A native of Queens, Brian has lived in Manhattan and Brooklyn until August 2024. He now resides in Larchmont with his wife, Claire, and their golden retriever, Rory. Brian is a graduate of the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts, and earned a Juris Doctor from the Fordham University School of Law. https://lnkd.in/eY7xrX96

Congratulations to first-time Wall Street 50 honoree Joseph J. Matthews CFA, CFP®. Joe is a Senior Institutional Consultant and Financial Advisor and has been the Branch Manager of Morgan Stanley’s Fairfield, CT branch since 2012. In these roles, he helps advisors address the needs of institutional and high-net-worth investors. Additionally, as a Government Entity Specialist Joe is designated by Morgan Stanley to assist municipalities with their retirement plans. Joe earned a bachelor’s degree in accounting and a master’s degree in organizational communication from Fairfield University and has been an adjunct professor there for 17 years teaching economics and finance. Joe has earned professional designations including Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) and Certified Financial Planner (CFP). Joe and his family have been members of Fairfield’s Gaelic-American Club for over 50 years. He is an Irish citizen by birth and his mother is a Donegal native. Joe and his wife Deb have 3 grown children and 2 grandchildren. https://lnkd.in/e8R7J2wZ

Congratulations to first-time Wall Street 50 honoree Ray Murphy. Ray Murphy has been a senior research analyst in municipal finance for over 25 years, the last 12 with the Fixed Income Group at Morgan Stanley Investment Management “(MSIM”). At MSIM, Ray focuses primarily on credits in the public power and transportation sectors within municipal finance, providing analytical research to a team of portfolio managers and traders managing roughly $70 billion in assets. Before joining MSIM, Ray was a Vice President/Senior Credit Officer at Moody’s Investors Service and Vice President at First Southwest Company Ray began his career in the public sector as a research analyst with the Commonwealth of Massachusetts’ Executive Office of Transportation and Construction. He earned an M.B.A. from Columbia Business School and a B.A. in Political Science from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Ray and his wife Mary Lynn have three children Dempsey, Brendan, and Sean Ray’s great-grandparents emigrated from Ireland in the late 1880s from Counties Kerry, Cork, and Dublin. Ray continues to maintain his connection to Ireland through his membership at Waterville Golf Links in County Kerry. He and his wife make frequent trips to Ireland and feel an especially strong connection to the country, its people, and its culture. https://lnkd.in/eKKBMjhr

Congratulations to returning Wall Street 50 honoree Anne Long, RICP®, CLU®. Annemarie “Anne” Long is president and national practice leader for CBIZ Life Insurance Solutions, Inc., a division of CBIZ (NYSE: CBZ). An accomplished financial services executive, Anne has served in leadership roles with Manulife (now John Hancock), Merrill Lynch, and NFP. Anne is a member of the College of Liberal Arts Board of Visitors at Temple University, her alma mater. She is also an inductee of Temple University’s Gallery of Success and the inaugural recipient of the Leonard Mellman Exemplary Board Service Award for the College of Liberal Arts. Born in Philadelphia to Irish immigrants from Co. Carlow (birth mother) and Co. Kilkenny (birth father), Anne was adopted by Larry and Bonnie Long, who helped foster a love of her Irish heritage. She says, “Discovering my Irish heritage has opened doors and created personal and professional connections. I live with optimism and see the possibilities, much like my birth mother did in coming to this country for the opportunities.” Anne holds dual citizenship in the United States and Ireland. Through her philanthropy, she has endowed The Long Family Internship at Temple University, which awards paid internships to first-generation liberal arts students to gain work experience and build professional networks. She holds the RICP® and CLU® designations from The American College of Financial Services. Anne lives in Northfield, NJ with her wife, Sarah. We missed seeing you at the Wall Street 50 awards dinner this year. I hope to see you soon.

Congratulations to returning Wall Street 50 honoree Kathleen Lauster, CFA. Kathleen Lauster, CFA, is a Senior Managing Director and Head of Ankura Capital Advisors, an investment bank based in New York. Guiding clients in their capital raising, M&A strategy, financial restructuring, and other special situations, Kathleen leverages her deep financial background and extensive industry relationships to create accelerated access to investment capital and perform value-added capital advisory. She has over 20 years of global financial services experience, working for and advising firms in Europe and the U.S. Prior to joining Ankura, Kathleen launched Fairfield Capital Advisors, a boutique middle-market investment bank. Previously, Kathleen held roles at Silver Leaf Partners, LLC and Houlihan Lokey, a global investment banking and restructuring firm, in New York and London. Kathleen’s mother’s family all hailed from Ireland – County Kerry and County Sligo, and her father’s family has roots in County Clare. She is very proud of her Irish heritage, having studied in Ireland in high school, and more recently worked in Dublin during the financial crisis. https://lnkd.in/e3im-XjY

Congratulations to Irish America Wall Street 50 honoree Sean O'Dowd. Managing Director of Silvercrest Asset Management Seán is focused on advising on liquidity events, independent valuation analysis, corporate governance, and business success planning. Prior to joining Silvercrest, Seán spent 13 years at Bessemer Trust, where he helped create Bessemer’s Family Company Advisory group, which provided corporate finance advisory services to clients. He has also worked in investment banking within Lehman Brothers’ Power Group and corporate finance and valuation work at Ernst & Young and KPMG. Seán holds a Bachelor of Commerce from the University of British Columbia and an MBA from the Yale School of Management. He is also a CFA Charterholder and a member of the New York Society of Security Analysts. Seán is extremely proud of his Irish heritage, with his father, Patrick, hailing from Kilglass, County Sligo, and is active in many community organizations including being on the Boards of the Emerald Isle Immigration Center and the Irish Business Organization of NY. In connection with the EIIC and IBO, he was one of the founding members of the Graduate Gateway initiative that helps J1 Graduate Visa Holders from Ireland obtain employment in the US. In 2020, Seán became the first North American Ambassador for the Celtic FC Foundation and is also part of the GlobalCelts network. He is also a Member of The Economic Club of New York. Seán is heavily involved with the Sigma Chi Fraternity for which he received the Significant Sig Award in 2022 and was recently one of several Distinguished Visitors for the Krach Transformational Leadership Program. Seán resides in East Norwalk, CT, with his wife Kristan and their twin girls, Maeve and Emily, and their dogs, Darby and Róisín. https://lnkd.in/eM37BiV5

Congratulations to first-time Wall Street 50 honoree Peter Kenny. Peter C. Kenny has spent 35 years on Wall Street, 25 as CEO/Founder of Kenny & Company LLC, a New York Stock Exchange member firm, and 10 years as Chief Global Market Strategist of Knight Capital Group. Peter is the 10-year Lead, now Independent Director of Bank OZK., frequently the largest CRE lender in the United States. As an Independent Director, Peter’s committee work is focused on corporate governance and compensation. Additionally, he serves as a Partner of 1517 Funds, Partner of Zelda Funds, and is an MPX Global Markets advisory committee member. Born and raised in Summit New Jersey, Peter was one of 12 children and is a father to four. He attended Warren Wilson College in North Carolina and the New School in NYC where he pursued his M.A. in International Political Economics. His family’s Irish lineage is traced back to County Clare on his father’s side and County Cork on his mother’s side. Peter is a National Corporate Director Association (NACD) member and Certified Board Leadership Fellow. He has been nominated to both the NACD Director 100 and NACD Director of the Year multiple times. Peter has received the Global Financial Leadership Award from Money 2.0 and is a member of the NYSE Buttonwood Club. https://lnkd.in/e8jjuZKY

Congratulations to returning Irish America Wall Street 50 honoree Conor Twomey. Conor Twomey is an executive leader with over 15 years of experience solving complex data challenges for leading global organizations. As Managing Partner of AI One, he helps businesses unearth hidden efficiencies and modernize their operations. AI One provides outcome-based solutions that enable clients to rethink their approach to technology and achieve lasting results. Formerly Head of AI Strategy at KX, Conor transitioned the company into a leading Enterprise AI platform, forging key partnerships with Microsoft, AWS, Google Cloud, NVIDIA, Intel, Databricks, and Snowflake. An Irish national, Conor has a technical background as a developer and architect, working with major real-time and historical data analytics systems in Tier 1 investment banks. His expertise spans capital markets, Formula One, manufacturing, life sciences, and IIoT. He holds an MSc in Computational Finance from the University of Limerick and a BSc in Financial, Mathematical, and Actuarial Sciences from University College Cork. A sought-after speaker and thought leader, Conor frequently writes and consults on AI technology advancements. Conor has also served as a World Economic Forum Global Shaper, a board member for University College Cork Alumni, and a US board member for GOAL Global. https://lnkd.in/egXamqtf