I and we are very pleased to announce that Operation HOPE national board member and my personal friend, Mr. Michael Arougheti, is confirmed to speak at the HOPE Global Financial Dignity Summit, in Atlanta, Georgia on November 14th-15th, 2012.
Michael J. Arougheti, has served as President of Ares Capital Corporation since May 2004 and as a director of the Company since 2009. Mr. Arougheti joined Ares Management in May 2004 and is a Senior Partner in the Ares Private Debt Group. He is a member of the Executive Committee of Ares Partners Management Company LLC. Mr. Arougheti is a member of the Investment Committees of Ares Capital Management, the Ares Private Debt Group, ACE (Ares' European private debt business) and Ares Commercial Real Estate Management LLC, the manager of Ares Commercial Real Estate Corporation. In addition, Mr. Arougheti is the Chairman of Ares Commercial Real Estate Corporation's Board of Directors. From 2001 to 2004, Mr. Arougheti was employed by Royal Bank of Canada, where he was a Managing Partner of the Principal Finance Group of RBC Capital Partners and a member of the firm's Mezzanine Investment Committee.
At RBC Capital Partners, Mr. Arougheti oversaw an investment team that originated, managed and monitored a diverse portfolio of middle market leveraged loans, senior and junior subordinated debt, preferred equity and common stock and warrants on behalf of RBC and other third-party institutional investors. Mr. Arougheti joined Royal Bank of Canada in October 2001 from Indosuez Capital, where he was a Principal, responsible for originating, structuring and executing leveraged transactions across a broad range of products and asset classes. Mr. Arougheti also sat on the firm's Investment Committee.
Prior to joining Indosuez in 1994, Mr. Arougheti worked at Kidder, Peabody & Co., where he was a member of the firm's Mergers and Acquisitions Group. In addition to serving as Chairman of the board of directors of Ares Commercial Real Estate Corporation, Mr. Arougheti also serves on the boards of directors of Investor Group Services, Riverspace Arts and Operation Hope. Mr. Arougheti received a BA in Ethics, Politics and Economics, cum laude, from Yale University.