Sector developments and company hires

North America
David Walker has joined CIFC as head of research, responsible for leading the firm’s US credit research platform and overseeing its team of 20 research analysts. Based in New York, he reports to CIFC ceo and cio Steve Vaccaro. With over 30 years of experience in debt and equity research in North America and Europe, Walker previously served as director of corporate credit research at Genworth Financial. Prior to that, he worked at Tricadia Capital Management, UBS and JPMorgan.

Kamakura has appointed Sou-Cheng Choi as chief data scientist, responsible for designing analytical models incorporating big data capabilities, as well as developing best-practice statistical methods for the Kamakura Risk Information Services and Kamakura Risk Manager platforms. Choi previously served as principal data scientist and lead researcher in machine learning for the automotive and life innovation groups at Allstate Corporation. She worked for Kamakura 20 years ago, prior to receiving her PhD in computational and mathematical engineering at Stanford University.