Thomas “Tom” Finke is a finance and investment executive who has achieved success at firms that include Wachovia, First Union Institutional Debt Management, and Bear Stearns. As the current chairman and CEO of Barings, LLC, Thomas Finke is responsible for managing billions of dollars in global assets and maintaining a strategic partnership with the Milken Institute.
The Milken Institute is a nonprofit think tank located in Santa Monica, California. With no partisan affiliation, the organization focuses on the most innovative methods to improve the global economy. The Institute's work is organized in three core areas; creating jobs, improving health, and advancing access to capital.
Financial Innovation Labs are a major part of the institute’s strategy to generate innovative economic solutions. A variety of stakeholders, including investment professionals and public officials, gather at the labs to discuss current fiscal policy issues. Each lab takes place over the course of a daylong workshop, and results in a lab report to assist with transforming ideas into reality. Lab themes have included investment in Asia’s infrastructure, models for financing vaccination efforts, and opportunities and challenges of industrial diversification in Bangladesh.
