HABA honors Jim Chanos



Jim Chanos, founder and Managing Partner of Kynikos Associates, the man who predicted the financial meltdown of two years ago, joined a prestigious group of people, such as US Senator Paul Sarbanes, Nikolas Tsakos of TEN Navigation, Peter Peterson of Blackstone Group, to name just a few, upon receiving HABA’s (Hellenic American Bankers Association) prestigious Executive of the Year Award during a lavish gala held recently at New York’s historical Union League Club. Entrepreneur John Catsimatides presented the award, praising Mr. Chanos for his vision and grasp of today’s labyrinthine financial world.

HABA’s President Georgia Mouzakis-Tavlarios welcomed the honoree and the more than 2500 guests, among them such notable figures as Michael Jaharis, C. Dean Metropoulos, James Orphanides and the Consul General of Greece to New York, Ambassador Aghie Balta. Mrs. Mouzakis-Tavlarios thanked HABA’s members and supporters for another fruitful year of activities and invited all to keep helping the organization to continue providing its invaluable service to the Greek American community, before passing the baton to Dorie Klissas, Director of Media Relations at NYU Langone Medical Center and the evening’s mc.

Jim Chanos, who was a guest speaker at a previous HABA event, right after the 2008 meltdown, said he was humbled and honored by the award. Speaking of Greece and the tough situation the country is going through, he reminded that none is completely water proof nowadays and he expressed his optimism for her ability to overcome, especially after a meeting he had with Prime Minister George Papandreou.

Born and raised in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Mr. Chanos currently lives in New York with his four children and is active in many charitable foundations and educational institutions. He opened Kynikos Associates in 1985 to implement investment strategies he had uncovered while beginning his Wall Street career as a financial analyst with Paine Webber, Gilford Securities and Deutsche Bank. Throughout his investment career, Mr. Chanos has identified and sold short the shares of numerous well-known corporate financial disasters; among them, Baldwin-United, Commodore International, Coleco, Integrated Resources, Boston Chicken, Sunbeam, Conseco and Tyco International. His celebrated short-sale of Enron shares was recently dubbed by Barron's as "the market call of the decade, if not the past fifty years."

As the largest exclusive short selling investment firm, Kynikos provides investment management services for both domestic and offshore clients. Through investment funds, partnerships, corporations and managed accounts, both domestic and offshore, Kynikos Associates maintains private portfolios of securities for clients. The funds, Ursus and Kynikos Opportunity, attempt to profit from the unusually high alphas found on the long and short side of the U.S. and non-U.S. equity markets.

The Hellenic American Bankers Association, Inc. is one of the premier Greek-American organizations in the New York metropolitan area. HABA is a not-for-profit organization established in 1982 to promote the professional and educational interest of Greek-Americans in the banking and finance industries. Its current active membership consists of over 200 professionals representing more than 50 institutions across the financial spectrum.

Since its inception, HABA has strived to serve the professional and educational interests of Greek-American financial professionals through the sponsoring of lectures, seminars, cocktail receptions with guest speakers and other events. Over the past years, HABA has had many distinguished speakers and lecturers. More info on the organization and its activities and be found at their website www.haba.org

©2010 NEOCORP MEDIA

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