Sovereign Finance Annual Economic Development & Investment Conference

TSW Community,

This week I'm at Sovereign Finance's Annual Economic Development & Investment Conference at Talking Stick Resort (Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community) in Scottsdale, AZ. If you're new to investing or want an overview of what's involved, this would be a pretty good conference to attend.

Important Note: Sovereign Finance is an investment advisor, so they would obviously like to have your business in addition to hosting pure-play "education" focused event. I haven't worked with them in a professional setting (no endorsement implied) - but they seem like good folks and they're 100% native (individual) owned.

On the agenda are two tracks:

(1) "Economic Development" (i.e., Direct Investing in Private Companies)
(2) "Investments" (i.e., Overall Investment Portfolio Management & Manager Selection)

In the Economic Development session, they are discussing the processes and approaches to direct investing in private companies. Basically, venture capital (investing in pre-revenue and/or pre-profit startups) and buyouts (taking control ownership of profitable, private companies). Guest speakers include two tribal groups - one focused on real estate investments (primarily hotels).

In the Investments session, they are focused on the management of a diversified, long-term portfolio of investments - including stocks, bonds and other private investments (mostly through external managers). Speakers included Carmel Wellso, Director of Research for Janus Henderson, who gave an in-depth market overview. I especially liked how the Sovereign folks started with a talk about risk and gave good structured examples of how to frame the investment discussion.

In Perpetuity.
-Jay