As Head of Investment Decision Research, Melissa Brown leads a seasoned team that provides unique insights into risk trends by analyzing the vast amount of data on market and portfolio risk. She and her team provide practical thought leadership to help investors make more informed decisions and to optimize the value of Axioma analytics solutions for portfolio managers and risk managers. Melissa’s perspectives enable clients and prospects to better understand and adapt to both the constantly changing risk environment and investment trends. Along with in-depth periodic analyses, such as the Quarterly Risk Insights, she produces timely whitepapers and blog posts on a broad range of topics of interest to investors and asset owners. She is also a frequent speaker on the subject of market risk and is often quoted in the financial media. Melissa joined Axioma, an innovative provider of quantitative risk analytics and portfolio-construction tools, in 2011. In 2024, Axioma became part of SimCorp, which is owned by the Deutsche Börse Group. She was previously Managing Director and head of the institutional business at Wintrust Capital Management. Before that she spent 10 years at Goldman Sachs Asset Management, ultimately serving as a Partner and co-head of Client Portfolio Management in the Quantitative Investment Strategies (QIS) Group, after spending several years as the senior portfolio manager for GSAM’s US Equity Strategy. Before joining GSAM she was Director of Quantitative Research at Prudential Securities, where she popularized the idea of the “cockroach theory” of earnings surprise and appeared on Institutional Investor’s “All-Star” list for 10 straight years. Melissa is a Chartered Financial Analyst. She holds a BS in economics from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and an MBA in finance from New York University.