Scott Best is a Managing Director of StoneCastle Securities LLC (“SCS”), where he is one of the partners managing SCS’s Corporate Credit Trading team. Mr. Best spent his Wall Street career in the Lehman Brothers Credit Trading Business until his retirement in 2006. Mr. Best created the Esoteric Credit Trading business at Lehman Brothers in the early 1990s and built the desk to command the top market share in private placement and esoteric secondary trading in each of his 13 years running the business at Lehman Brothers trading private placements, credit tenant leases, project finance, infrastructure notes, and structured aircraft, rail and shipping securities. Mr. Best was promoted to Managing Director in March of 2002. He retired in 2006 to address a serious back injury which culminated in a triple vertebrae fusion surgery in 2008. With his back fixed, Mr. Best returned to the business in 2010, to join his former colleague from Lehman, Jim Gregorek, and Mr. Taylor trading through StoneCastle’s broker-dealer. Mr. Best graduated from Sheffield City Polytechnic with First Class Honors in a Bachelor of Engineering and from Massachusetts Institute of Technology with a Master of Science in Management. Mr. Best lives in Utah with his wife and four children.

Matt Faranda is a Managing Director of StoneCastle Securities LLC (“SCS”), where he is one of the partners managing SCS’s Corporate Credit Trading team. Mr. Faranda has spent nearly 20 years on Wall Street. He began his career in Debt Capital Markets at Deutsche Bank originating and structuring private placements, credit tenant leases, and other structured credit deals for the firm’s corporate clients. In 2006, Mr. Faranda joined Lehman Brothers in the Esoteric Credit Trading business. After the acquisition by Barclays of the Lehman Brothers US business, Mr. Faranda led the Esoteric Credit Trading business from 2009-2016, where he was responsible for market-making in private placements, credit tenant leases, project finance, infrastructure notes, aircraft EETCs and other structured aircraft, rail and shipping securities. In 2016, Mr. Faranda joined Mr. Best and Mr. Taylor at StoneCastle Securities. Mr. Faranda is a graduate of Georgetown University where he earned a BA in Physics. Mr. Faranda lives in New Jersey with his wife and two children.

Larry Taylor is a Managing Director of StoneCastle Securities LLC (“SCS”), where he is one of the partners managing SCS’s Corporate Credit Trading team. Mr. Taylor spent almost 15 years in credit research at Credit Suisse and Donaldson, Lufkin and Jenrette (DLJ) and was a Managing Director at Credit Suisse and the Associate Research Director of the firm’s Leveraged Finance research organization. Mr. Taylor began his investment career at MetLife, where he worked in the company’s private placement group and managed money for outside clients. Over his career as a research analyst, Mr. Taylor has covered a broad variety of sectors across high grade, high yield and structured securities and has been cited as a top credit analyst. Mr. Taylor earned recognition as a ranked analyst by Institutional Investor magazine 24 times during his career, including 11 #1 rankings. In a 20-year retrospective of its All-America Fixed Income Research Team, Mr. Taylor was recognized as one of the top 10 most recognized analysts of all time. In 2010, Mr. Taylor joined Mr. Best to start the business at StoneCastle Securities. Mr. Taylor has a BA in Economics from Haverford College and an MBA from the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania where he was honored as Palmer Scholar at graduation. Mr. Taylor is a CFA charter holder. Mr. Taylor lives in Westchester County New York with his wife and two children.

Richard Lopez is a Managing Director of StoneCastle Securities LLC (“SCS”), where he is one of the partners managing SCS’s Corporate Credit Trading team. Activities of the team include secondary trading, new issue origination, portfolio analysis and liquidation as well as pricing and other consulting services. Mr. Lopez has spent over 17 years on Wall Street. Prior to joining SCS he was an Assistant Vice President at Lehman Brothers and Barclays Capital where he worked on the esoteric credit trading desk. Mr. Lopez is a graduate of Fordham University where he earned a BS in Finance. Mr. Lopez lives in Connecticut with his wife and three children.

Jamie Brownback is an Associate at StoneCastle Securities LLC (“SCS”) where he is a member of SCS’s Corporate Credit Trading team focused on illiquid corporate credit securities. Jamie is actively responsible for coverage and trade execution for a number of the firm’s institutional clients ranging from insurance companies to hedge funds. Additionally, he assists the team with credit analysis, bond modeling, trade/data analytics and portfolio valuation. Prior to joining SCS, Jamie was a student at St. Lawrence University where he earned a BA in Economics and Business. Mr. Brownback lives in New York City.

Joe Caradimitropoulo is an Analyst at StoneCastle Securities, LLC (“SCS”) where he is a member of SCS’s Corporate Credit Trading team. Joe is responsible for quantitative modeling, credit research & analysis, and liaising with SCS’s Operations team. Joe graduated from Carleton College in 2020 where he earned a BA in Statistics and Economics. While in school, Joe played club water polo and competed in NCAA DIII Men’s Track & Field. Mr. Caradimitropoulo lives in Charlottesville, VA, and has plans to move to New York City.

Stacey Breaks is a Vice President of StoneCastle Securities LLC “SCS”) where she is a member of SCS’s Corporate Credit Trading Team.   She is responsible for quantitative analysis and modeling. Prior to joining StoneCastle, Ms. Breaks was a VP at Lehman Brothers in the Esoteric Credit Trading business, where she worked with Mr. Best  trading private placements, credit tenant leases, project finance, infrastructure notes, and structured aircraft, rail and shipping securities.  She began her career on Wall Street over 20 years ago in Debt Capital Markets at Goldman Sachs. Ms. Breaks has a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from MIT and an MBA from Columbia Business School. She lives in New Jersey with her husband and two sons.

Shawn Clegg is a Trading Assistant at StoneCastle Securities LLC (“SCS”) where he is a member of SCS’s Corporate Credit Trading team.  Prior to joining SCS he was at Zions Bancorporation in the company’s retail loan group which worked closely with Zions Bancorporation’s affiliate banks. Mr. Clegg received a BA in Business Finance and MBA Delta Mu Delta from University of Phoenix.  Mr. Clegg lives in Utah with his wife and three children.

Robert Holmen is President of StoneCastle Securities, LLC where he is a partner and has day-to-day oversight responsibility for all aspects of the business. He is also the firm’s Financial and Operations Principal (FINOP) and Chief Compliance Officer (CCO).

Prior to joining StoneCastle in 2010, Mr. Holmen worked at Guggenheim Securities (and its predecessor Links Securities) for over fourteen years. During his tenure, he held various positions including CFO, Compliance Officer, FINOP, and Senior Managing Director and Co-Head of Fixed Income. Mr. Holmen was also a founding member of Guggenheim Partners. Prior to Guggenheim, he helped build a sub-prime mortgage originator in the U.K. called Mortgages PLC. Mr. Holmen also has over ten years of marketing experience working for various advertising agencies on financial services related accounts including GMAC, MasterCard, and Great Western Bank. He also worked at Chemical Bank building their affinity credit card program. Mr. Holmen graduated with a B.A. in English from Kenyon College in 1983. Mr. Holmen lives in New York City with his wife and two children.

Shannon Jemmoth is a Managing Director of StoneCastle Securities, LLC.  Mr. Jemmoth is the Head of Operations and is responsible for the firm’s books and records as well as the day-to-day clearance, settlement, and reporting of all the firm’s transactions.

Prior to joining StoneCastle, Mr. Jemmoth was Managing Director at Guggenheim Securities, where he built the operations group for the firm. Mr. Jemmoth has also worked for Citibank, ABN Amro, and ING Barings.

Mr. Jemmoth has over 25 years of brokerage and banking operations experience and holds a series 99 license.

Xiomara Larios is a Vice President and Senior Compliance Analyst at StoneCastle Securities. In her present role, Ms. Larios works closely with the chief compliance officer to monitor, maintain, and implement applicable regulatory requirements and internal policies and procedures.  In 2010, when the firm launched the Corporate Credit Trading desk, Ms. Larios joined the broker-dealer to help form and manage the operations and settlements areas.

Ms. Larios joined StoneCastle Partners in 2004. During her tenure at StoneCastle, Ms. Larios has held positions as Investor Relations Manager and Office Manager. Ms.Larios helped design and establish StoneCastle Partners’ daily operations, administrative functions, and data management systems. Prior to joining StoneCastle Partners, Ms. Larios was the Office Manager for Parametric Capital Management, a hedge fund and asset manager.

Ms. Larios holds a B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania. She lives in New York City.