Sanjeev Handa

Sanjeev Handa is an established board member and senior advisor with over thirty years of global experience in the financial, real estate and securitization markets.  He is known as a leader and consensus builder with a deep understanding of investments, risk management, compliance and corporate governance.  Sanjeev qualifies as an audit committee financial expert.

Sanjeev is a member of the Board of Advisors of White Oak Partners, a leader in multi-family real estate investments with almost $2 billion of assets under management and is a member of the Investment Committee. Sanjeev is an Independent Director of Oak Hill CLO Enhanced Equity II, an affiliate of Oak Hill Advisors. Oak Hill is a leading alternative investment firm with approximately $52 billion of assets under management. Sanjeev is an Independent Director of Carlyle Tactical Private Credit Fund, a closed-end investment management company.  The adviser to the fund is an affiliate of The Carlyle Group, a global investment firm with $260 billion of assets under management. Sanjeev is the Chair of the Audit Committee and serves on the Nominating and Governance and Independent Trustees Committees. Sanjeev retired, in 2020, as an Independent Director of Fitch Ratings, Inc., and its global affiliates due to term limits. As Chair of the Compliance Committee, Sanjeev focused critically on the credit ratings process and the company’s internal control framework.

As the founder and managing member of Old Orchard Lane LLC, Sanjeev provides consulting services to organizations in the financial and real estate markets. Currently, Sanjeev is a Senior Advisor to DigiPli, a RegTech firm with a mission to revolutionize how financial institutions meet their compliance and anti-money laundering obligations, and to Simon-Kucher, a global consulting firm with a clear focus on its clients’ top line growth. Sanjeev is also an advisor to the Chief Investment Officer of the United Nations Joint Staff Pension Fund providing independent advice as it transitions to a new strategic asset allocation. The UNJSPF has approximately $90 billion of assets under management. In other engagements, Sanjeev provided advice to a publicly listed financial services firm as it expanded its capital markets capabilities into structured finance and real estate, and he provided independent strategic advice to a real estate investment firm during the launch of a new strategy. Sanjeev is recognized as an expert in fixed income, real estate and securitization investments and has participated in numerous government and industry forums focusing on these markets.

Sanjeev serves on the Board of Directors of the Mutual Fund Directors Forum. The MFDF is an independent organization that serves the independent directors of mutual funds and other registered investment companies by enhancing fund governance and by providing directors with a strong voice in key policy debates in the fund industry. Sanjeev is also a member of the Investment Committee of the Board of Trustees of The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art. The Investment Committee oversees Cooper Union’s endowment. Sanjeev is an Adjunct Professor of Finance at Fairfield University’s Dolan School of Business. His focus is teaching undergraduates about global capital markets.

For almost three decades, Sanjeev held a series of investment and executive management positions at TIAA-CREF and served on various enterprise level governance committees including the Asset Liability Committee Working Group, Investment Management Committee, Model Risk Management Committee, Fair Value Pricing Committee and the Investment Risk Management Committee.  He retired as the Head of Global Real Estate (Fixed Income) in 2014. In this role, Sanjeev had responsibility over TIAA-CREF’s private commercial mortgage-related investment strategies aggregating $30 billion. From 2006-2011, Sanjeev was Head of Global Public Markets and had responsibility over TIAA-CREF’s public fixed income mutual fund, variable annuity, and insurance portfolios. He successfully navigated the $140 billion aggregate portfolio through the global financial crisis by implementing rigorous risk management processes to mitigate credit, operational and counterparty risks. Sanjeev led the expansion into new asset classes such as leveraged loans, credit default swaps, and distressed investments. New products launched during his tenure included a ESG related initiatives, bond index fund, target date funds, structured credit strategies, and a local currency emerging market fund. He was the primary fixed income investment liaison to the Board of Trustees during the annual 15c investment advisory renewal process. Sanjeev also oversaw the restructuring of the securities lending business from an internally managed business to an outsourced platform.

Sanjeev received undergraduate degrees from The Cooper Union in Civil Engineering and New York University in Applied Science in 1984.  He earned an MBA from the University of Michigan in 1988.