Kiplinger: Stock Market Today: Markets Turn Tail as Ukraine Invasion Risk Rises

Steven M. Sears is the president, chief operating officer, and co-founder of Options Solutions. The investment firm uses conservative options strategies to help clients enhance stock returns and reduce risk.

Mr. Sears has deep experience in the options industry as an investor, exchange executive, and journalist.

Mr. Sears was part of executive teams that modernized the U.S. options market and introduced electronic trading. He helped lead the first securities exchange IPO, which led to the birth of the modern exchange industry.

As an author, and as a journalist for some of the world’s leading financial publications, he has dedicated himself to narrowing the information gap that exists between institutional and individual investors.

His book, The Indomitable Investor, introduced many people to the often counter-intuitive thoughts and actions that sophisticated investors use to better navigate the financial markets.

As a journalist, Mr. Sears evolved financial markets coverage to include the stock and options trading communities that had been largely ignored by the national media.

He pioneered coverage of trading, options markets, and exchanges, for The Wall Street Journal, Barron’s, and Dow Jones Newswires. His coverage made options trading and investment strategies a permanent part of market analysis and media coverage. His investigative reporting dramatically improved how options are traded, priced, and regulated.

He has been recognized by the Cboe, the world’s largest options exchange, for contributing to the development and growth of the global volatility and options market. Cboe also credited him for naming the Cboe Volatility Index, or VIX, the “Fear Gauge,” which has come to be as ubiquitous in finance as major stock indexes.

Mr. Sears is a graduate of the University of Georgia, where he has served as a trustee and as the chairman of an independent media company. He is a member of the Economic Club of New York.

William (Bill) Speth has been in the investment business since 1982.  He is the Chief Research Officer of Options Solutions LLC.

He has been involved in the introduction of some of the financial market’s most important innovations, helping to create options and futures on the Cboe Volatility Index, or VIX, which spurred the development of the global volatility market.

Mr. Speth also serves as the Senior Advisor to the CEO and interim Head of Research for the World Federation of Exchanges (WFE).   He has been a member of the WFE Statistics Advisory Group since 2008 and was recently the Vice-Chairman.

Previously, Mr. Speth was Senior Vice President, Global Head of Research for Cboe Holdings.  He led product development, focusing on volatility and the Cboe Volatility Index, or VIX.  Mr. Speth also worked on policy issues related to liquidity, capital and tax treatment for options, and the use of options and futures in investment funds.

Mr. Speth began his career as a market maker in the CBOE’s index trading pits.  He has a Bachelor of Science degree in Physics from LeMoyne College and a Master’s of Science in Electrical Engineering from the University of Rochester.

Mr. Brodsky has a track record of leading organizations and enhancing performance. He is the co-founder and the CEO of Options Solutions, LLC.

Michael J. Oyster has been in the investment business since 1994. He is the Chief Investment Officer of Options Solutions LLC. Mr. Oyster has broad experience as an investment strategist, analyzing institutional fund managers and advising investors on their portfolio allocations, construction, and manager selection.

Mr. Oyster’s investment career began in 1994 as the Senior Quantitative Analyst with Schaeffer’s Investment Research. He analyzed equity and index options, financial markets, and behavioral metrics, and also managed several options-based investment strategies.

In 1999, he joined Fund Evaluation Group LLC (FEG), an institutional advisory and asset management firm. He researched traditional and hedge fund managers, advised institutional investors, and analyzed markets and the economy. Mr. Oyster led the firm’s research and due diligence efforts on options-based investment strategies, which enabled him to develop a broad, singular understanding of the tools and techniques of successful options-based managers and also of the pitfalls that have bedeviled the unsuccessful.

As FEG’s Chief Investment Strategist, Mr. Oyster’s counsel was regularly relied upon by investors for his expertise on markets and economic matters. He advanced established academic research to develop a momentum analysis strategy to improve asset weighting decisions at the portfolio level. He also led the firm’s investment allocation efforts and deployed $4 billion of discretionary capital.

Mr. Oyster is a graduate of the University of Cincinnati with a BBA in Finance, a Chartered Financial Analyst holder, and a Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst holder. He is a member of the CFA Institute, the CFA Society of Cincinnati, the CAIA Association, and the American Mensa. He is a Board member of the Freestore Foodbank Foundation and the Lincoln W. Pavey Educational Foundation. Michael is the author of two investment books, the more recent of which, Success in a Low Return World, was published by Palgrave Macmillan in November 2018.

Amalia Rosen is Director of Marketing and Investor Relations at Options Solutions LLC, a veteran marketing and business development executive with more than 20 years of management experience in marketing, operations, and revenue generation.

She has been in marketing and business development leadership roles for a number of public and private companies, with the aim of planning and proactively leading the development and execution of overall marketing and communications strategies.

As Director of Investor Relations and Business Development at Options Solutions, she oversees all aspects of investor communications, product marketing, and demand generation, including the development and execution of strategies required to deliver effective messaging, awareness, and adoption of our investment solutions.

Prior to joining Options Solutions in 2019, Amalia was the Worldwide Vice President of Marketing for Determine Inc, a SaaS provider specializing in downstream financial management and procurement solutions. Amalia led efforts to rebrand the company and relaunch on the NASDAQ, dramatically increasing brand awareness, audience growth, customer loyalty, and revenue. Amalia has managed the marketing and revenue generation department in industries ranging from  SaaS Software, Online Media, Search Marketing, Telecommunications, and Gaming. Some of those companies include MCI Communications, AOL, Network Solutions, Virgin Group, Churchill Downs and Youbet.com

Amalia holds a BA in Psychology and Spanish from Rollins College. She is active with the Hydrocephalus Association and on the board for STEP, Secondary Transition a program for life after high school for parents of children with special needs.

John Nolan is the Chief Financial Officer and Chief Compliance Officer of Options Solutions. Mr. Nolan brings over thirty years of accounting and operational finance leadership roles for public, and private companies in the SaaS, Management Consulting, Telecommunications, and Computer Hardware industries.

Mr. Nolan has been CFO of several private and public companies, responsible for creating reporting and forecasting systems that improve visibility into companies’ operations for owners and investors. Prior to joining Options Solutions, Mr. Nolan served as CFO of the publicly traded enterprise software provider Determine, Inc. He helped to lead the successful integration of two acquisitions, rationalized accounting processes and controls across the new entity, raised nearly $20m in equity and debt financing, and then led the process to sell the company.

Prior to Determine, Mr. Nolan served as CFO and COO of the national management consultancy Quadel Consulting. He led major expansion efforts in disaster recovery services and implemented more rigorous quality standards using software monitoring tools. As the Vice President of Corporate Finance at MCI, he implemented Sarbanes Oxley controls and created the financial portion of the plan of reorganization. As a Cost Accountant at IBM, he oversaw $500m in computer component inventory.

Mr. Nolan has spoken on financial leadership and costs analysis at Chief Financial Officer Magazine, Better Management Live, and IDC conferences. The costing systems he put in place at MCI received the Enterprise Intelligence award from the software company SAS.

Mr. Nolan has a bachelor’s degree in Management from Tulane University and a Master’s degree in Business Administration from the University of Texas at Austin. Mr. Nolan is a licensed CPA. He serves as board chair for the education non-profit Center for Inspired Teaching and previously served on the boards of the children’s theater Imagination Stage and the poverty services organization SOME.

William J. Brodsky has been in the investment business since 1968. He is Chairman of Options Solutions LLC.

William J. Brodsky is internationally-acknowledged as one of the foremost leaders of the options industry and investment community. His efforts have led to dramatic improvements in market structure, tax treatment, market quality, and investor education.

From 1997 to 2017, Mr. Brodsky was Chairman of CBOE Holdings Inc. He was Chief Executive Officer from 1997 to 2013, leading the exchange’s demutualization and initial public offering, and the creation of futures and options on the CBOE Volatility Index (VIX).  

Mr. Brodsky also was the Chairman of the World Federation of Exchanges and the International Options Market Association.  Earlier in his career, he was President and CEO of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, where he was instrumental in developing and globalizing stock index futures and the Globex trading system.  He began his career at Model Roland & Company, working with his father, who was the firm’s Managing Partner.

Mr. Brodsky has served on the Board of Directors of Northwestern Memorial Hospital and affiliates for 22 years, including 14 years as Chairman of the investment committee and Chairman of the Hospital Board from 2012 to 2016. He is currently the Chairman of Chicago’s Navy Pier Inc. and an advisor to Madison Dearborn Partners.