Brian Jacobsen is chief portfolio strategist at Wells Fargo Funds Management, LLC. In addition to his role at Wells Fargo conducting research and giving presentations on the markets and the economy, Mr. Jacobsen is an associate professor at Wisconsin Lutheran College. His research and teaching center around economics, finance, and investing. Prior to joining Wells Fargo, he was chief economist at an investment consulting firm.

Mr. Jacobsen has an undergraduate degree in finance and a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Wisconsin, and a law degree from Marquette University Law School. He has earned the right to use the Chartered Financial Analyst^® (CFA^®) and Certified Financial Planner^™ (CFP^®) designations.

 

 

James Kochan has over 35 years of investment industry experience. Prior to joining Wells Fargo, he was director of fixed-income asset management and a bond market strategist at Robert W. Baird & Co. He spent the ten years before that at Merrill Lynch, working as a fixed-income strategist and manager of fixed-income research. Mr. Kochan has also held research positions with Chase Manhattan Bank and The Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland. While at Merrill Lynch, he was named to the Institutional Investor All-America Research Team for bond market strategy. His research reports are frequently quoted in the financial press.

Mr. Kochan has graduate and undergraduate degrees in economics from the University of Wisconsin. He currently serves as an adjunct faculty member in the School of Business at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee.

 

 

John Manley is chief equity strategist at Wells Fargo Funds Management, LLC. He has more than three decades of investment industry experience, earning distinguished accolades along the way. Mr. Manley spent the majority of his career with Smith Barney and its successor firms, where his roles included chief quantitative strategist, chairman of the Investment Policy Committee, and chief U.S. portfolio strategist. He also worked with that firm's private client effort as senior U.S. equity strategist. He is a seven-time member of the Institutional Investor All-America Research Team and was voted "Most Popular Analyst" in the Smith Barney Financial Advisor poll for several years running.

Mr. Manley earned a bachelor's degree from Stanford University and a law degree from Boston College. He has earned the right to use the Chartered Financial Analyst^® (CFA^®) designation.

 

 

Jim Paulsen is chief investment strategist at Wells Capital Management. An investment management industry professional since 1983, Mr. Paulsen develops investment strategies that assist in the management of separate institutional account assets, as well as mutual and collective investment funds. In 1997, he joined Norwest Investment Management, Inc., which later combined with Wells Capital Management. Prior to that, Mr. Paulsen was the senior managing director and chief investment strategist for Investors Management Group in Des Moines, Iowa. Earlier, he was president of SCI Capital Management in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Mr. Paulsen is nationally recognized for his views on the economy. He frequently appears on several CNBC and Bloomberg television programs, including regular appearances as a guest host on CNBC. BusinessWeek named him Top Economic Forecaster, and BondWeek twice named him Interest Rate Forecaster of the Year. For more than 25 years, Mr. Paulsen has published his own commentary assessing economic and market trends through his newsletter, Economic and Market Perspective, which was named one of "101 Things Every Investor Should Know" by Money magazine. He earned bachelor’s and doctoral degrees in economics from Iowa State University.