Chicago SRI/ESG/Impact Breakfast Group - Wednesday 10/15 Fixed Income

Our conversation will explore fixed income and impact:

• Fixed income represents the largest asset class globally. Yet, impact investing is typically only considered within private markets. Why?
• Fixed income is the investment tool most commonly used to scale and support proven business solutions. How is this being applied to impact, and where are the opportunities?
• How can responsible fixed income be incorporated into investment portfolios? Why is this perceived as more challenging than it may actually be?
• When integrating impact into fixed income investments, does this automatically imply a reduction of the risk/return profile?

This conversation builds upon concepts discussed in the recent paper: Scaling Solutions: The Fixed Income Opportunity Hiding in Plain Sight - Tideline.

Speaker Bios

Stephen M. Liberatore, CFA®, Portfolio Manager, Head of ESG/Impact, Global Fixed Income, Nuveen

Steve is the lead portfolio manager for Nuveen’s fixed income strategies that incorporate Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) criteria and Impact investments. He is also a member of the Investment Committee. Steve was a member of the ICMA Green Bond Principles initial executive committee and subsequently its Advisory Council. He serves on the Steering Committees of the Debt Conversion for Nature and Climate Practice Standards and the Orange Bond Principles. He is also a member of the UN Capital Development Fund’s working group on Climate Resilient Infrastructure Finance, Sustainalytics’ Investor Committee and the board of the Fixed Income Analysts Society, Inc.. He is a frequent speaker at conferences and a subject matter expert across media outlets. Steve and his team were awarded “Impact Report of the Year (for Investors)” at Environmental Finance’s (EF) 2025 Sustainable Debt Awards. Previously, Steve and team were recognized as “ESG Fund of the year –fixed income” at EF’s 2024 Sustainable Investment Awards in addition to “Investment team of the year –asset manager” and “Fund of the year –fixed income” at EF’s 2023 Impact Awards. In addition, Steve and team have also been acknowledged as “Investor of the Year” (EF 2020 Bond Awards) and “Impact Report of the Year (for Investors)” (EF 2022 Bond Awards). Steve graduated with a B.S. from the State University of New York at Buffalo and an M.B.A. in Finance and Operations from Wake Forest University. He holds the Chartered Financial Analyst® designation and is a member of the CFA Society of North Carolina and the CFA Institute.

Noelle Laing, Chief Investment Officer, Builders Initiative

Noelle is Chief Investment Officer of Builders Initiative and is a member of the Builders Vision Leadership Team. She is responsible for the investment management of the Builders Initiative Foundation endowment and an impact-driven LLC. Previously, Noelle was a managing director at Cambridge Associates. While there, she worked with institutional and family clients to develop and execute mission-related and impact investing programs and portfolios. Her impact investing knowledge and thought leadership related to asset classes and impact themes are highly regarded. She is a frequent speaker and panelist on impact investing topics. In addition to working with dozens of institutional investors and family offices throughout her years at Cambridge Associates, Noelle also worked directly in the investment offices of the American Red Cross and at Taft Hartley Pension Plan. Noelle is a CFA charter holder and earned a bachelor’s degree with honors in mathematics from St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York.

Moderator

Shari Gilfillan, SVP, Senior Client Investment Officer / Not-for-Profit OCIO at Northern Trust Asset Management

Shari Gilfillan is a Senior Client Investment Officer on the Not-for-Profit client team within Northern Trust’s Multi-Manager Solutions business. Shari works directly with foundations, endowments and other non-profit entities under an open architecture /outsourced CIO custom investment framework in the development of complex investment programs. This includes the development of investment policies, asset allocation recommendations, investment manager search, selection and oversight, portfolio construction, and ongoing management of the overall investment program. Shari’s experience includes extensive work with asset allocation, open architecture implementation, cash flow planning, concentrated equity positions, alternative investments, and complex account architectures. She serves as a member of Northern Trust’s Not-for-Profit Investment Committee, which is actively involved in the approval of significant strategy recommendations and managers before they are implemented in client portfolios. Shari also leads the OCIO Impact Collaboration Group at Northern Trust. Shari has served as a Senior Institutional Portfolio Manager within the Institutional Investments and Philanthropic Solutions Group at Bank of America Private Bank and as a Senior Client Portfolio Manager on the Sustainable Global Equities Team at UBS Asset Management (formerly Brinson Partners) for 20 years where she was an early adopter of using quantitative ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) data in a historically fundamental investment process. Shari holds a Bachelor’s degree in Finance from Miami University (Ohio) and an MBA from DePaul University (Chicago). She has contributed to Steering Committee Meetings for the GISR (Global Initiative for Sustainability Ratings) and is a member of the Chicago SRI – ESG - Impact Investing Breakfast Group, and Women Investment Professionals.

We look forward to seeing you on Wednesday, October 15th!

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Chicago SRI-ESG-Impact Breakfast Group Organizers

John Hoeppner

Liz Michaels

Dan Nielsen

Lucas Schoeppner

Leah Yablonka

Impact Engine

If you would like to join the private Chicago SRI-ESG-Impact Breakfast LinkedIn Group, click here. If this message was forwarded to you and you would like to be added to the invitation list for this group, click here.

Background of the group: Some of our group who work in ESG/SRI/Impact investing realized that we were spending more time on the coasts connecting with other industry peers, so in 2012 we began holding quarterly meetings to figure out who was doing what in the Chicago region. We intentionally try to go “mainstream” – in other words, focusing on investment professionals who are trying to figure out the SRI/ESG world because of client demand or perceived business opportunity. This is a different starting point than many traditional SRI/ESG groups, which have come at this from a values-first perspective. The group has grown to include people from institutional investment consultants, private banks, UHNW wealth advisory firms, universities, and asset managers. We typically have more than 120 people attend.