Smith Breeden Co-Founder Douglas Breeden Named 2013 IAQF/SunGard Financial Engineer of the Year

DURHAM, NC--(Marketwired - Jan 22, 2014) - Amundi Smith Breeden today announced that Smith Breeden Associates Co-founder and former Chairman Douglas T. Breeden, PhD, has been named the 2013 IAQF/SunGard Financial Engineer of the Year (FEOY). Amundi Smith Breeden LLC (formerly Smith Breeden Associates, Inc.) is the North American investment headquarters for Amundi, a top 10 global asset manager.

The award will be presented to Dr. Breeden by IAQF Senior Fellow, former FEOY winner and Nobel laureate Robert C. Merton during the IAQF/SunGard FEOY Award Gala Dinner on February 6, 2014 at the Museum of Mathematics in New York City. The annual IAQF/SunGard FEOY Award, established in 1993, recognizes individual contributions to the advancement of financial engineering technology. The International Association of Quantitative Finance (IAQF; formerly the IAFE) is the not-for-profit, professional society dedicated to fostering the profession of quantitative finance by providing platforms to discuss cutting-edge and pivotal issues in the field. SunGard is a leading global software and technology services company.

"I am honored to be included among such distinguished winners. Prior winners' works have profoundly affected applied research and the practice of finance around the world in central banks and on the global Wall Street, as well as in pensions, endowments, mutual funds, banking and insurance. I thank the Board and the Senior Fellows of the IAQF for this honor, as well as SunGard for supporting this prestigious award," said Dr. Breeden.

"Dr. Breeden has made significant contributions to financial engineering and continues to be a source of inspiration to his colleagues and students. SunGard, along with the IAQF, is proud to once again sponsor the Financial Engineer of the Year Award and recognize the work of industry pioneers such as Dr. Breeden," said Steven Silberstein, chief technology officer, SunGard.

Dr. Breeden joins a prestigious list of recipients of the IAQF/SunGard Financial Engineer of the Year Award. Previous recipients include: Robert Engle, Peter Carr, Richard Roll, Bob Litterman, Bob Litzenberger, Jack Treynor, Jim Simons, Phelim Boyle, Oldrich Alfons Vasicek, Darrell Duffie, Jonathan Ingersoll, Andrew Lo, Emanuel Derman, John Hull, John Cox, Robert Merton, Fischer Black, Mark Rubinstein, Stephen Ross, and Robert Jarrow. Myron Scholes received a lifetime achievement award in 2001.

"I can think of no one more deserving of this recognition than Doug Breeden," said Mike Giarla, Chief Executive Officer of Amundi Smith Breeden. "For more than three decades, Doug has made major contributions in quantitative finance, investment management and banking. He has also inspired hundreds of his students (of which I was one) to pursue careers in the academy, industry and public service, and provided them with the necessary preparation."

"Doug has the rare ability to undertake original research that has immediate application and long lasting impact. Furthermore, he is one of the very few people possessing both the ability to conduct such pioneering research and the insight to apply that research effectively in the financial markets. Indeed, it was Doug's applied research approach that formed the basis for our company in 1982 -- an approach that continues to guide our activities today," Mr. Giarla continued.

"We are proud to be able to continue our collaboration with Doug. On behalf of all of our colleagues at Amundi and Amundi Smith Breeden, congratulations to Doug on this well deserved honor," Mr. Giarla concluded.

Nominations for the annual IAQF/SunGard FEOY Award are submitted by a nominating committee of approximately 100 people, representing the IAQF governing boards. They are then reviewed in a two-step process by a selection committee of 25 members, including the IAQF board of directors and senior fellows. The 2013 selection committee was chaired by Dr. Robert Engle, an IAQF Senior Fellow, 2011 FEOY award winner and Nobel laureate.

Dr. Breeden is the William W. Priest Professor of Finance and former Dean of Duke University's Fuqua School of Business. He also serves as Senior Research Consultant for Amundi Smith Breeden (formerly Smith Breeden Associates), a money management firm he co-founded and was Chairman of from 1982 to 2005. He has served on faculties at the University of Chicago's Booth School and Stanford Business School. He was the Fischer Black Visiting Professor of Financial Economics at the Sloan School of Management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 2011 to 2013.

Breeden has published seminal research on state prices and risk neutral densities implicit in option prices, on the consumption capital asset pricing model (CCAPM), as well as on mortgage securities and hedging. The Founding Editor of the Journal of Fixed Income, he served as its Editor for 10 years. In 1988, he was elected to the Board of Directors of the American Finance Association and in 2010 was elected a lifetime Fellow.

He is Chairman of Community First Financial Group, a bank holding company, and serves on the boards of the Commonfund and the Financial Management Association. Breeden holds a PhD in Finance from Stanford and an SB from M.I.T.

About Amundi Smith Breeden (ASB)
Amundi Smith Breeden manages U.S. fixed income strategies for separate accounts and funds, and serves as advisor for Amundi global investment portfolio managers on U.S. fixed income allocations. Amundi Smith Breeden was formed in 2013, with Amundi's acquisition of Durham, NC-based Smith Breeden Associates, an institutional asset management firm specializing in the major U.S. fixed income sectors. Amundi, headquartered in Paris, France is a leading global asset manager with close to EUR750 billion in assets under management, 3,000 institutional clients, and 100 million retail clients worldwide via its partner networks.