Charlie Friend is currently an MBA Candidate at Carnegie Mellon University’s Tepper School of Business. His previous experience is in asset and wealth management with firms such as Ameriprise Financial, Morgan Stanley, and Federated Hermes.

Prior to business school, Charlie served as Associate Financial Advisor and Investment Specialist with Granite Peak Wealth Advisors, a $1bn private wealth advisory practice of Ameriprise Financial. While at Granite Peak Wealth Advisors, Charlie was responsible for implementing and monitoring multi-asset investment allocations for retail and institutional clients of varying size. Charlie also served on the practice’s Investment Committee and collaborated with the firm’s CEO and other advisors to formulate the team’s first discretionary model portfolios.

Before Granite Peak Wealth Advisors, Charlie worked for Morgan Stanley’s Workplace Solutions Group, where he handled trading and transactions for equity compensation plan participants of over 100 publicly traded firms. Prior to Morgan Stanley, Charlie served as Internal Regional Consultant with Federated Hermes, where he worked to grow assets for the firm’s $30bn AUM equity and fixed income SMA enterprise.

Charlie has been affiliated with the Pittsburgh Kids Foundation since 2009 and many of his fondest memories are from PKF camps and his time spent in Haiti.  He grew up attending Surf City and Laurelville as a camper and middle school leader with Fox Chapel Presbyterian Church and then served as a staff member of both camps for 5 years following high school. Charlie was a summer intern with the PKF in 2016, where he spent a month in Cap-Haitien helping to formulate new ideas to support small businesses of IDADEE and EBAC graduates.

Charlie has a bachelors degree in Finance from The Ohio State University. He holds FINRA Series 7 and 66 licenses and is a proud CFP® Professional. In his free time, Charlie enjoys skiing, golf, and playing guitar.