Greenwich Economic Forum plans conference in Miami

GREENWICH — The Greenwich Economic Forum, one of the financial-services industry’s premier gatherings, has announced that it will hold a late-winter conference in Miami.

The “winter GEF” is scheduled for March 14 at the Perez Art Museum Miami, with about 150 people expected to attend. It will complement the annual GEF conference held in Greenwich.

“We have been asked since inception in 2018 how we plan to scale GEF, and doing a ‘winter GEF’ in Miami seemed logical,” GEF Co-Founder and Co-Chairman Bruce McGuire told Hearst Connecticut Media. “Miami is also becoming an important crypto (currency) hub and a second office for many New York and Connecticut financial firms.”

Confirmed speakers include Miami Mayor Francis Suarez; Nassim Nicholas Taleb, author of “The Black Swan;” Paul Colonna, president and chief investment officer at Lockheed Martin; and Ari Paul, chief investment officer at BlockTower Capital.

McGuire, a University of Miami alumnus, said the GEF had forged a strong partnership with the local government in Miami.

“Interestingly — and good for Greenwich — the city of Miami was quite insistent that we call it Greenwich Economic Forum-Miami and not simply Miami Economic Forum,” McGuire said. “We gave them that choice, and they understood the power of the Greenwich brand.”

The financial services industry in Florida — particularly in Miami-Dade County — has grown significantly in recent years. In 2020, Miami-Dade had 214 Securities and Exchange Commission-registered investment advisers — up 101 from its total in 2014 and accounting for 31 percent of the state’s SEC-RIAs, according to data compiled by the Miami Downtown Development Authority.

“While Greenwich is the ‘capital of capital’ for Connecticut, under the leadership of city of Miami Mayor Francis X. Suarez, we aspire to be the ‘capital of capital’ for the world,” said Keith Carswell, senior adviser to the city manager for the city of Miami. “The GEF is one of the world’s most influential conferences for the global invest(ment) industry, and therefore supporting this endeavor aligns squarely with the mayor’s vision.”

The main GEF conference will again be held at the Greenwich Delamar hotel. Since its launch in 2018, it has taken place at the waterfront venue every year, except for 2020 when it was online-only because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

This year’s gathering at the Delamar is planned for the week of Oct. 10. Greenwich resident Ray Dalio, founder of Westport-based Bridgewater Associates, the world’s largest hedge fund, is scheduled to make a keynote appearance for the fifthstraight year.