Joseph P. Simon, Jr. (“J.P.”) - Founder, Chairman & CIO

JP serves Optio as its Founder, Chairman and CIO, overseeing the firm’s investments, entrepreneurial culture and client/partner relations. Since founding Americus Capital in 2009, he has sourced, structured and executed transactions valued at over $1.5 billion in enterprise value across a multitude of asset classes and sectors. JP brings a dynamic skill set in his experience acting in capacities as attorney, capital markets adviser, commercial real estate developer and principal sponsor in transactions completed both domestically and abroad. Flagship properties with his thumbprint include the Xavier (Old Town, Chicago), The Jones (River North, Chicago) and The Emme (River West, Chicago), comprising 704,000 vertical feet and 640 units of Hyper Core quality mixed-use developments (executed with Gerding Edlen Green Cities Fund LP II & III). JP also led numerous acquisitons and financings within the CRE and corporate private equity universe for assets such as: the Hotel Jerome (Aspen, CO), the Continnum Technology Park (Chandler, AZ), the Tampa Tribune building (“Tampa, FL); the mission critical asset portfolio of Tvilum - Denmark; and the Vantage Portfolio comprised of 1,000+ apartment units stretching the Austin/San Antonio Corridor. Prior to Americus/Optio, JP worked as an associate attorney for specialty law firms focused on middle market corproate transactions and insurance subrogation litigation for catastrophic losses, respectively. JP earned his Juris Doctor from the UIC/John Marshall Law School (Chicago) with post degree coursework in Corporate Finance and Financial Accounting at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. He earned his Bachelor’s degree at the University of Wisconsin - Madison where he was a member of the Division I Men’s Ice Hockey program. JP is admitted to practice law in Illinois.

Jeffrey D. Simon - General Counsel & Chief Technology Officer

Jeff is admitted to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and is Optio’s general counsel. He leads technology heavy opportunities and intangible asset review and valuation. As a patent attorney in the Health Care Group at 3M, Jeff engaged in drafting and filing patent applications, including reviewing invention disclosures, discussing further inventions and strategies for claiming an invention as well as plans for their manufacturing and marketing. Jeff is experienced in the prosecution of domestic and international patent applications for a wide variety of Health Care Business Group technologies, including applications relating to medical devices, drug delivery systems, automated culture inoculation systems, as well as adhesive and pharmaceutical compositions. Prior to 3M, Jeff worked in private practice as an associate intellectual property attorney. He earned his Masters in Biotechnology from Johns Hopkins University. He earned his juris doctor from the University of Minnesota Law School as a Dean’s Merit Scholarship winner after earning his Bachelor’s in Biochemistry from Albion College under a Presidential Scholarship Award. Jeff is admitted to the patent bar in addition to his admission to practice law in both Michigan and Minnesota.

Todd Smith - Operating Partner & Co-Founder of Optio Affiliate, Dreamview Labs

Todd is a seasoned entrepreneur and career marketer with over 30 years experience. His career began in sales and marketing with Saturn Corporation. Involved in most aspects of the brand’s early years including retailer selection, product merchandising, events and field operations, Todd’s passion for the totality of the customer experience was born. After completing his MBA, that passion continued to flourish during his time at Chrysler where he played a key role on the integration team during the merger with Daimler. In 2000, Todd co-founded and led Clear!Blue, an innovative communications agency which grew to over 70 employees, three offices and $30 million in revenue. Clear!Blue won numerous awards for creativity, product launches, growth and culture. In 2005 the company was ranked the 20th largest privately-owned PR firm in the U.S. by PR Week and achieved the prestigious Inc. 500 list in 2006. Todd was an Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year finalist and listed in Crain’s Detroit “40 under 40.”

In 2011, Todd became involved in numerous early-stage companies and helped structure and secure funding for some of them. That led to his creation of Dreamfield Ventures and he’s now been involved in the growth of over 15 companies. Todd has served on various philanthropic boards including the Southeastern Michigan Boys & Girls Club. He is an occasional Guest Lecturer at the Tippie College of Business and has served as a mentor for the Iowa Startup Accelerator. 

Todd holds a BBA in Marketing and an MBA in Marketing and Finance from the University of Iowa. In addition, he is a 2007 graduate of the Entrepreneurial Masters (formerly Birthing of Giants) program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Jay Lenstrom - Operating Partner for BookedOut Technologies

Jay is a world-class marketer who blends a proven track record of building companies, accelerating brands and leading teams to overachieve. He has held leadership positions for companies in the industries of CPG, Sports & Entertainment, Marketing Services, Healthcare and he has launched four new ventures. Throughout his professional career Jay has been provided a tremendous education in launching new products (250+) working with 15 of Top 20 Fortune 100 companies and developing impactful programs for 20+ billion dollar brands. Jay earned an MBA from Marquette University, a BA in Accounting from Nebraska Wesleyan University and a Bachelor of Science in Business from the University of Nebraska - Lincoln.

Annie Puffer - Operating Partner for Booked Out Technologies

Annie has overseen operations at BookedOut since 2014 ensuring that all customer relations and product development are synchronous.
A native of Chicago, Annie earned her degree at the University of Iowa. Prior to Booked out, Annie worked in the sports & communications worlds for the likes of the BigTen Network and the Chicago Bears. She gathered agency experience, in Australia, working with adidas and the National Rugby League.

The Basis/Blockfills team has over 100 years of combined leadership experience in technology, trading and banking at some of the world’s largest and most prestigious institutions in our industry.

Nick Hammer - Co-Founder and Group CEO

Nick serves as the CEO of Basis Capital Group, Inc. (“BGH”) and is responsible for the vision of the company. Nick began his financial career in 2001, working in Fixed Income at ABN AMRO Bank N.V. He has since held various positions in the financial services industry including roles in banking, equities, fixed income, futures, and OTC FX trading. He was an owner and principal of Lotus Brokerage, a Chicago based futures and FX Broker responsible for raising over 20,000 FX accounts on a global level from 2008-2012. He also served as a Director and Board member for Direct FX Trading, a Sydney Australian based FX dealer from 2012- 2014. Nick has a strong background in the derivatives and eFX marketplace, with experience servicing a wide variety of clientele including institutional, algorithmic, high frequency and retail traders. Nick has held FINRA Series 3, 7, 30, 34, and 63 licenses. He also holds an RG146 license with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission and serves as a Board Member of two e-commerce companies.

Gordon Wallace - Managing Director

Gordon has an exceptional track record and experience in trading Foreign Exchange, developed over his 25-year career in FX markets. He was previously Global Head of FX Trading at Deutsche Bank (EUR 1.2bn revenues), where he was responsible for a global team of 175 including trading, sales, structuring, risk and IT/infrastructure. Whilst at DB, Gordon was part of the firm wide Trading Committee and he oversaw the creation and building of their highly successful “FX Autobahn” platform. Gordon also ran Global FX Derivatives and Proprietary Trading at Credit Suisse. Additionally, his experience includes prominent roles on the buy-side, including Head of Macro FX Trading at Citadel, Infinium Capital Management and Meadowvale Asset Management. Throughout his career, Gordon has worked in New York, Chicago, London and Tokyo.

Perry Parker - Managing Director

Perry spent over 30 years in financial markets managing investment portfolios. This career started as a member of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange with Goldman Sachs, before serving various roles for Goldman in Chicago, London, and New York. In 1996, he joined Deutsche Bank, rising to become the Global Head of Spot FX trading and later head of Non-Franchise trading. After leaving Deutsche Bank, Perry became a founding partner and senior portfolio manager at Grant Capital Partners, a discretionary global macro hedge fund, before his most recent role as Head of Market Risk and leader of the investment team at a thematic hedge fund, One River Asset Management. In 1994, starting with a personal investment of $5,000, Perry founded the FIRST, a National Banking Association, along with a group of businessmen in the Hattiesburg, MS area.  Today the First has more than 600 employees and over $4 billion in assets. In addition to the bank's success, Perry has successfully invested in cattle grazing, feeding, row crop farming, real estate, and other small business throughout Mississippi, California, and the American Southwest. At Basis, Perry is focusing on providing FX and Agriculture hedging solutions to companies in Latin America.

Adam Krauszer - Chief Technology Officer

Adam is a 15 year veteran of the securities industry and is a founding member of Harmonic. Harmonic offers boutique quantitative execution services for cryptocurrencies and derivatives leveraging proprietary strategies enabling institutional investors to have access to low cost execution, reduce market impact, and improve investment performance.

Adam has held a number of roles in research, trading, software development, operations and oversight at various firms, including Citadel Investment Group and BNP Paribas. Adam was an early member of Citadel’s High Frequency Trading group, and held various positions within it. Adam was responsible for Citadel’s European proprietary trading business, as well as the founder and head of its institutional Algorithmic and Principal Flow business worldwide. Adam holds a Masters Degree in Computer Science from Cornell University.

Adam’s role as a managing member of Harmonic is to design the architecture of the proprietary research and trading technology suite. As part of this, he collaborates and leads the development and implementation efforts of the proprietary execution algorithms responsible for the Harmonic agency trading models, and is responsible for research and development to uncover and evolve innovative execution strategies.

Anders Henrikson - Local Director [UK] & Managing Director

Anders is a financial services executive with more than 15 years of experience delivering strategic growth initiatives, creating value propositions and developing high-performing teams. He has extensive expertise in the areas of Trading, Risk Management, Treasury and Technology, including market structure, digital execution concepts and real-time payment solutions, and is fluent in industry regulatory matters. His business acumen and domain expertise reflect senior roles and international assignments with leading firms including Lloyds Bank, where he held a number of key positions in the Markets business, most recently Global Head of FX Products and prior to that Head of FX Sales & Trading, and Citigroup, where he held positions as Head of FX Options Trading North America (NY) and Head of FX Options Trading Europe (London). His buy-side experience includes the role as General Manager, Nokia Finance International (Geneva).

Phil Millar - Local Director [UK] & Interim COO/CCO

Phil serves as a Director of the company and interim COO/CCO from our London office. He has over twenty-five years’ experience working in the financial services industry including senior positions at HSBC and CME Group, focusing on delivering strategic global projects primarily covering OTC and listed derivatives. He most recently was responsible for managing key Exchange partnerships in Asia Pacific working with board members to achieve business growth and development. Having spent ten years working and living in Asia, Phil has a considerable understanding of cultural nuances and is adept at managing relationships at all levels. He has a BA in Economics and Politics from the University of Kent, Canterbury and a Diploma in Business Administration from Edinburgh University.

Juan E. Nates - Head of LATAM for FX & Commodities

Neil Van Huis - Sales

Adam Collingbourne - Software Development

Michael Olson - Software Engineer

Mitchell Zaretsky - Software Engineer