Roger W. Ferguson Jr.
Chief Investment Officer & Director
Roger W. Ferguson, Jr., is the Chief Investment Officer, the Chairman of the Investment Committee, and a Director at Red Cell. Dr. Ferguson is the Steven A Tananbaum Distinguished Fellow for International Economics at the Council on Foreign Relations. He is the immediate past President and Chief Executive Officer of TIAA, the leading provider of retirement services in the academic, research, medical, and cultural fields and a Fortune 100 financial services organization. He was responsible for guiding the company through both the 2008 financial crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic, expanding the customer base by nearly 1 million new clients, and ensuring the company maintained strong financial health while meeting its commitments to millions of retirees. He also oversaw the doubling of the company’s assets under management to over $1 trillion, cementing their position as one of the world’s premier asset managers.
From 1999 to 2006, Dr. Ferguson was Vice Chairman of the Board of Governors of the U.S. Federal Reserve System. He represented the Federal Reserve on several international policy groups and served on key Federal Reserve System committees, including Payment System Oversight, Reserve Bank Operations, and Supervision and Regulation. As the only Governor in Washington, D.C. on 9/11, he led the Fed’s initial response to the terrorist attacks, taking actions that kept the U.S. financial system functioning while reassuring the global financial community that the U.S. economy would not be paralyzed.
Prior to joining TIAA in April 2008, Dr. Ferguson was head of financial services for Swiss Re, Chairman of Swiss Re America Holding Corporation, and a member of the company’s executive committee. From 1984 to 1997, he was an Associate and Partner at McKinsey & Company. He began his career as an attorney at the New York City office of Davis Polk & Wardwell.
Dr. Ferguson serves on the boards of Alphabet, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOGL); Corning (NYSE:GLW); Blend Labs Inc. (NYSE:BLND), and International Flavors & Fragrances, Inc. (NYSE:IFF). He is also active as an advisor and board member with various private fintech companies. Dr. Ferguson is a member of the Smithsonian Institution’s Board of Regents, a fellow of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, and co-chairs its Commission on the Future of Undergraduate Education. He serves on the boards of The Conference Board, the Institute for Advanced Study, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, and Columbia University’s Teachers College and other non for profits. He is a fellow of the American Philosophical Society and a member of the Economic Club of New York, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Group of Thirty, and the National Association for Business Economics. Dr. Ferguson served on President Obama’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness as well as its predecessor, the Economic Recovery Advisory Board, and he co-chaired the National Academy of Sciences’ Committee on the Long-Run Macro-Economic Effects of the Aging U.S. Population.
Dr. Ferguson holds a B.A., J.D., and a Ph.D. in economics, all from Harvard University.
