Global Public Investment Funds Forum

About

Public investment funds—sovereign wealth funds (SWF), public pension funds (PPF) and other public asset owners—are important participants in the international monetary and financial system. These investors face distinctive challenges and opportunities, including the ability and need to invest over long time horizons. They are also subject to unique governance, legal, and regulatory constraints. At the same time, with more than $30 trillion assets under management, the asset allocation and investment activities of public investment funds have enormous impacts on the global economic landscape.

Understanding how the worlds of investing, national politics, investment stewardship and activism intersect demands sophisticated legal and financial analysis, risk management, and, increasingly, technological insight. Many of these topics are the focus of the research of faculty at NYU’s School of Law, Stern School of Business, and Tandon School of Engineering. A collaboration between the largest investors in the global economy and the leading group of academics will provide an unmatched platform for mapping and shaping the future of investing. Leveraging the unrivalled ecosystem in New York City and NYU’s unparalleled global reach, GPIFF will serve as a unique platform to explore modern investing at the intersection of law, finance, politics and technology.

These topics will be analyzed from multiple perspectives, reflecting the fact that modern investing operates at the intersection of law, finance, politics and technology. GPIFF will draw on the knowledge and expertise of colleagues in other NYU centers and institutes, including:

 

Center for Human Rights and Global Justice logo

 

Grunion Center for Law and Social Entrepreneurship

 

Frank J. Guarini Center for Environmental, Energy, and Land Use Law logo
Institute for International Law and Justice (IILJ) logo

 

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Program Directors

Kevin Davis

Faculty Director, Kevin Davis

Kevin Davis is the Beller Family Professor of Business Law at New York University School of Law. His research and teaching generally concern the relationship between law and economic development, with particular emphasis on anti-corruption law, commercial law, and measurement of the performance of legal systems. His publications include over 50 articles or essays, four edited volumes, and a monograph, Between Impunity and Imperialism: The Regulation of Transnational Bribery (Oxford University Press, 2019). He has held visiting appointments at Cambridge University’s Clare Hall, Fundação Getulio Vargas School of Law (São Paulo), the University of Southern California, the University of Toronto, and the University of the West Indies (Barbados), and has lectured at many other institutions around the world.

Davis joined the NYU law faculty in 2004 and served as Vice Dean for Global Affairs from 2012 to 2017. Before joining NYU, he was a tenured member of the faculty at the University of Toronto, Faculty of Law, worked as an associate at Torys LLP in Toronto, and served as law clerk at the Supreme Court of Canada to Mr. Justice John Sopinka. He holds a B.A. from McGill University, a LL.B. from the University of Toronto, and a LL.M. from Columbia University.

Winston Ma

Executive Director: Winston Ma, CFA

Winston Ma, CFA & Esq., is an investor, attorney, author, and adjunct professor in the global AI-digital economy. He is a partner of Dragon Global, an AI-focused family office (founding member: Dragon.AI) and an Adjunct Professor at NYU Law School on SWF fund and tech investing topics.

Most recently for 10 years, he was Managing Director and Head of North America Office for China Investment Corporation (CIC), China’s sovereign wealth fund. Prior to that, Mr. Ma served as the deputy head of equity capital markets at Barclays Capital, a vice president at J.P. Morgan investment banking, and a corporate lawyer at Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP.

A nationally certified Software Programmer as early as 1994, Mr. Ma is the author of more than 10 books on SWF funds, digital economy, and global geopolitics, including The Hunt for Unicorns: How Sovereign Funds are Reshaping Investment in the Digital Economy). He has been a member of NYU President's Global Council since its inception. He was selected a 2013 Young Global Leader at the World Economic Forum (WEF), and in 2014 he received the NYU Distinguished Alumni Award.