As the keynote speaker for FEI’s Annual Claremont Finance Conference, Todd Barker '01 will cover the historical evolution of the hedge fund industry that started out with funds holding long and short positions to cancel out the risk exposure to systematic market movements and has now transformed into the modern “pod shops” where multiple portfolio managers operate within a centralized framework consisting of guardrails around risk, capital allocation, leverage constraints, and the use of technological infrastructure. Students will learn how market-neutral equity investing strategies generate alpha by controlling factor exposure and how the pod-shop model allows for more efficiency in capital allocation, better risk management, and improved return performance over time. This annual gathering of CMC students and alumni in the finance industry offers great opportunities to reconnect with current students and multi-year alumni of the Student Investment Fund, the Robert Day Scholars program, and other Claremont friends in the finance sector and will also feature a panel discussion on public versus private markets.