Family Office Round Table – A conversation about the issues of greatest concern to the world’s wealthiest families with industry insiders

For Joseph Ehrlich Joe joined the Owens Group in 2004 and represents the third generation of the Owens family at Owens Group. He leads the firm’s Family Office and Private Equity Practice Areas, where he helps families and clients with complex insurance needs.

Prior to joining the Owens Group, Joe spent many years practicing law with O’Melveny & Myers LLP and its predecessor, O’Sullivan Graev & Karabell LPP. During that time, he assisted clients in evaluating, structuring, negotiating, and consummating private equity transactions.

Joe graduated cum laude from Columbia University with a B.A. in Classics in 1992. He received his J.D. from New York University’s School of Law in 1997. Joe serves as President of the NYU Law Alumni Board. He also volunteers as Chair of Columbia University’s Benefits Committee, is a member of the Columbia University Alumni Association (CAA) Strategic Planning Committee and several other committees of the CAA. Joe is also a board member of the Columbia Club of New York.

Joe regularly participates on panels, including the Opal Family Office conferences in New York, Newport and Napa Valley.

Karl Douglas Widely recognized as an expert in energy finance, Karl Douglas is an experienced investor and family office advisor with a demonstrated investment track record spanning over $1B of transactions ranging from structured finance to private equity.

Since 2016 Mr. Douglas has been a Managing Director at PPMT Capital, a multi-family office, where he heads transaction origination and business development. PPMT represents some of the most prestigious family names in the world. Under his tutelage, PPMT Capital has completed over $300M of investments since 2015, in middle market energy and industrial sectors.

Before joining PPMT, Mr. Douglas had 30 years experience as an entrepreneur, business development professional and investment professional at firms such as JPMorgan, Merrill Lynch, Terra Nova Capital and UCC Capital Partners. Mr. Douglas majored in economics at Princeton University and completed Post Graduate Studies in Business/Managerial Economics at Edinburgh Business School.

Wendy Craft Wendy currently holds the position of chief operating office of Favara LLC, a family office focused on real estate but allocating to other sectors which include pharmaceuticals, venture and certain areas of the tech industry. The family office serves three generations of the family and is based in New York City.

Previously, she held the position of executive vice president and general counsel for Fulcrum Equities, a single family office that invests in real estate and operating companies on its behalf. The office handles the holdings of a real estate family and also co-invests with other family offices on a variety of projects around the world.

Previous to that, she worked with the Schneider Family service as their vice president and general counsel and assisted them in separating the existing family office from the family’s operating company. The Schneider Family is a prominent real estate family in New York and has a foundation that services children’s charities around the world.

Having received her BA from Kalamazoo College, MI, she continued her education at Thomas Cooley Law School with a concentration in international law. She also received the American Jurisprudence Prize Award in Conflicts of Laws. She then attendee Georgetown University Law School and attained her LL.M. in taxation.

Additionally, Wendy is a member of many Family Office Associations. She has served on the Advisory Board for Family Office Exchange. She has also served as a committee member for the NYSSCPA Family Office Committee in New York and serves on the Steering Committee for the NYU Sterns Family Office Council. She is a frequent speaker on Family Office Topics in the United States and abroad.

Thomas Handler is an advanced planning attorney focused on the analysis and structuring of sophisticated estate plans and family offices, and handling taxation and business planning issues for business owners, executives, professional athletes, celebrities and family offices. He has extensive experience in the analysis, design and implementation of domestic and international business planning, financial and estate planning, asset protection, family office compliance and advanced tax planning strategies. Mr. Handler is a managing partner in Handler Thayer, LLP, where he chairs the firm’s Advanced Planning & Family Office Practice Group.

His experience includes tax controversy, estate contests, tax litigation, public accounting and corporate and foundation directorships. He is active in Chicago Bar Association activities including its Taxation and Trust Law committees, and has authored numerous professional articles. He has lectured extensively both nationally and internationally at wealth industry, professional and family office educational conferences. Mr. Handler created the Asset Protection Profile™ and Stealth Prenup™ in addition to other proprietary strategies for affluent families and family offices.

Mr. Handler has been named to the Wealth Strategies Design Team comprised of fifteen of the top wealth planners in the U.S., to the Citywealth Global Leaders List of Top Wealth Planning Attorneys, to Who’s Who in American Law and Who’s Who in America. Illinois Leading Lawyers named Mr. Handler one of the Top Lawyers in the areas of Closely and Privately Held Business Law and Trusts, Will and Estate Planning Law. In 2016 he was ranked in the Citywealth Global Leaders List of Top 100 Lawyers in the U.S. He also won the Excellence in Estate Planning Award and was again named to Leading Lawyers and Lawyers of Distinction. In 2015 he was named International Wealth Planner of the Year and Wealth Planning Gamechanger Lawyer of the Year in addition to receiving the Michael J. Brink Wealth Industry Leadership and Service Award.

He earned a Bachelor of Sciences in Accountancy degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a Juris Doctor degree, Law Review, from DePaul University College of Law in Chicago, Illinois. Mr. Handler is a recognized thought leader in the advanced planning and family office marketplaces who has been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, Chicago Tribune, New York Times, Worth Magazine, Financial Times, Barron’s, Christian Science Monitor, Family Office Review, Las Vegas Review-Journal, Chicago Sun-Times, Structured Products Magazine, ABA Journal, National Law Journal, Crain’s Chicago Business, Derivatives Weekly, Family Wealth Report, Wealth Manager Magazine and other publications. He has appeared as an expert commentator on numerous radio and television programs.

Oleksandr Skoblia is Chief Legal Counsel of all.me social media & Managing Partner of Interconsulting Law Firm (ILF), an international law firm with regional and associate offices worldwide that advises family offices on cross-border transactions, investments & digital economy; corporate finance, commercial and tax law.

Mr. Skoblia has over 17 years of expertise for different international projects in over 35 countries.

Mr. Skoblia advises on different international aspects related to corporate structuring, sophisticated legal services for investment solutions, ICO and digital economy.

Ziad K. Abdelnour is a Wall Street Financier, Author, Philanthropist, Activist, Lobbyist, Oil & Gas Trader & President & CEO of Blackhawk Partners, Inc., a New York based private equity “family office” that focuses on originating, structuring, advising and acting as equity investor in management-led buyouts, strategic minority equity investments, equity private placements, consolidations, buildups, and growth capital financing in companies and projects based both in the US and emerging markets and the trading of key physical commodities.

Mr. Abdelnour is also Founder & Chairman of the Board of the Financial Policy Council ; a 501 (c) (3) non-profit organization designed to give its select group of supporters the opportunity to have direct face-to-face dialogue with the nation’s quintessential powerbrokers and policymakers.

Since 1985, Mr. Abdelnour has been involved in over 125 transactions worth in aggregate over $10 billion in the investment banking, high yield bond and distressed debt markets and has been widely recognized for playing an integral role in those three key market sectors.

Mr. Abdelnour is an astute market player who also serves on the Advisory board of DPG Investments, a recognized premier multi strategy global merchant banking, alternative investment, management and advisory firm.

On a more personal level, Mr. Abdelnour, former President of the Arab Bankers Association of North America, is the author of “Economic Warfare: Secrets of Wealth Creation in the Age of Welfare Politics” ; a best seller manuscript written for investors that need to navigate the troubled geopolitical waters of the post-crisis world and a prolific writer for 100+ entrepreneurial and financial publications advising and educating investors in private equity, hedge funds, crowdfunding, Sovereign Wealth Funds, fund-of-funds, angel networks, venture capital and family offices.

Mr. Abdelnour is also a regular speaker on Private Equity, Physical Commodities trading and Middle East geo-political analysis at industry conferences & TV outlets nationwide including but not limited to Fox News, Newsmax, etc…and a key “influencer” in his own right having a hard core constituency of over 2 million viewers having read his blog postings and analyses since January 2014.

Mr. Abdelnour holds an MBA in Finance from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania and a BS in Economics, Summa Cum Laude, from the American University of Beirut.

He was recently listed as one of the 500 Most Influential CEOs in the World.