George K. Baum & Company Expands National Housing Group

DENVER, March 4, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- The recent growth in the national housing market, along with the success of  GKB Mortgage Markets LLC, our newest affiliate, has led George K. Baum & Company ("GKB") to promote and welcome several new additions to their National Housing Group and the Specialty Finance Products Desk.

"I am pleased to announce the promotion of Beth Riley, as well as the additions of Kathy Li and Misty Dalke to our National Housing Group.  I'm also pleased to announce the addition of David Adams to the Specialty Finance Products Desk.   Mortgage Markets  is a business marketed by the National Housing Group with operations run off of the Specialty Finance Products Desk, and is currently engaged by seven state and local housing finance agencies to manage the mortgage pipeline risk associated with their programs.  Mortgage Markets assists low-to moderate-income and first-time homebuyers with purchasing affordable homes. To date, we [GKB & Mortgage Markets] have assisted our clients in sponsoring more than $250 million in mortgages. These successes have driven the growth within GKB's National Housing Group."
– Guy Yandel, Executive Vice President & Manager, Public Finance, George K. Baum & Company

Beth Riley, Senior Vice President with GKB, has been promoted to Manager of the National Housing Group. Ms. Riley has more than 25 years of experience in the housing banking and mortgage lending business, including product development, loan servicing and lending compliance. Ms. Riley has developed and/or executed single-family MRB transactions as Senior Banker for Ohio Housing Finance Agency, Delaware State Housing Authority, Missouri Housing Development Commission, Oklahoma Housing Finance Agency, Washington State Housing Finance Commission and Pinellas County Housing Finance Authority. She is also one of the lead bankers in the Firm's Single Family Market Rate Program Administration. Ms Riley has been based in the Municipal Finance Headquarters in Denver, CO for 11 years.

GKB has strengthened their quantitative and analytic group with the addition of Kathy Li as a Senior Vice President in the Housing Group. Based in Atlanta, GA, Ms. Li's role will be to develop and expand quantitative services, and to provide technical and structuring support to the GKB housing bankers. Ms. Li brings more than 15 years of experience working with state and local HFAs and government entities. Her experience includes providing primary analytical, structuring and advisory services, and developing sustainable financing strategies for several government entities. Ms. Li is a CFA and holds an MBA from Georgia State University. She received her MS in International Finance from Northwestern Polytechnical University (Xi'an, China) and her BS in Finance from the University of Accountancy and Finance of China in Beijing.

The Housing Group also added Misty Dalke as an Associate to provide quantitative analysis to the Housing Group. Her responsibilities include compiling data and reporting on the GKB Weekly Roundup, a summary of the National Housing Market. She brings more than eight years of finance experience, including accounting for municipal bond funds and securities compliance. Ms. Dalke received her BSBA in Finance from the University of Denver. She also has her law degree from the University of Denver and is a licensed Colorado attorney. Ms. Dalke is a member of the Denver and Colorado Bar Associations.

To assist with the growth of the Mortgage Markets business, GKB added David Adams as Vice President on the Specialty Finance Products Desk. Mr. Adams has more than seven years of housing experience. He works with the Mortgage Markets business to assist with the management of clients' mortgage pipelines, and with variable rate bids and municipal financial products. Prior to joining GKB, Mr. Adams worked as Finance Manager for Colorado Housing and Finance Authority ("CHFA"). While at CHFA, Mr. Adams managed bond portfolios and developed and managed the MBS market rate program. His experience includes creating interest rate risk and loan pipeline management models for new production, as well as existing pipelines and implementing loan pooling and trading strategies in the TBA market. Mr. Adams has hedged, pooled, issued and settled more than $1.5 billion in Ginnie Mae and Fannie Mae MBSs. He has also been involved with structuring more than $1.5 billion in single family and multi-family bond issuances. Mr. Adams graduated from Texas A&M University with a BS in Kinesiology and holds a MS in Finance from the University of Colorado. 

About George K. Baum & Company: George K. Baum & Company has long been recognized as an industry leader in the structuring, underwriting and marketing of taxable and tax-exempt municipal securities, and is one of the nation's most experienced privately held investment banking firms. George K. Baum & Company has been involved with many types of capital projects including: Local Government, Independent, Public K-12 and Charter Schools, Colleges, and Universities.

Founded in 1928, GKB maintains a well-established presence—staffed with approximately 200 professionals, with public finance offices in 15 cities across the United States, including sales operations in five major cities. GKB is uniquely positioned to provide issuers of, and investors in, municipal securities with the highest level of service.

SOURCE George K. Baum & Company