Christianna Wood
Education
M.B.A., finance, NYU Stern School of Business
Summary of Experience
Ms. Wood is an expert in institutional investing, global corporate governance, equity and bond portfolio management, financial analysis, and securities analysis, with over 35 years of experience in the asset management industry. She also has expertise in investment management and asset allocation of pension funds, mutual funds, insurance companies, endowments, and foundations. She has served as an expert witness in litigation involving asset allocation, investment policy, investment manager due diligence, public pension plans, corporate governance, securities analysis, and portfolio management.
Ms. Wood led the $150 billion equity, hedge fund, and activist portfolios for the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS), the largest public pension plan in the US. She also managed the CalPERS corporate governance program and Focus List engagements, including its environmental, social, and governance (ESG) strategies. Ms. Wood’s other ESG activities include serving as board chair of the Global Reporting Initiative, tasked with setting global sustainability disclosure standards for over 5,000 companies worldwide. She is a former CEO of Capital Z Asset Management, one of the largest independent sponsors of hedge funds, where she was responsible for minority equity ownership in 11 hedge funds across $7 billion in equity, fixed income, and commodity strategies.
Ms. Wood serves on numerous boards of directors, having chaired the audit, corporate governance, and investment committees of the boards of several financial institutions. Previously, she was a member of the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) Investor Advisory Group, the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) Standing Advisory Group, and the International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board (IAASB) Consultative Advisory Group. She is a frequent speaker on topics that include sustainability reporting, corporate governance, ESG disclosure, best practices of boards of directors, global alpha generation, and hedge funds. Ms. Wood was a 2018 Harvard University Advanced Leadership Fellow.
