Candace Browning
Head of Global Research, Bank of America Merrill Lynch
What better way to explore "creative disruption" in the markets than with a creative approach? To give clients some fresh perspective on how innovation is upending business segments, Candace Browning and her team recently hosted an event with speakers from Google and Tesla.
Though the team puts out plenty of reports — 70,000 a year, in fact — the chance to hear from people inside such forward-thinking companies clearly resonated, as the event was standing room only.
But Browning is doing more than just talking about change ahead. She is working to be part of it. Over the past year, she and her team were central to the development of an innovative service that allows institutional clients to more easily compare analysts' forecasts.
Called Visible Alpha, the service launched in May 2015 with investments from Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Citigroup, Jefferies, Morgan Stanley and UBS. It's designed to make analyst projections more useful in real time by extracting the underlying data and standardizing it across the participating firms. It is currently in the pilot phase and set to expand operations next year.
Now the insight Browning is gaining in her research work is about to be put to use for her own company's benefit. She was recently appointed as executive sponsor for financial technology investments in global banking and markets. As such, she oversees the management of vendor relationships and technology used across the business.
Outside of B of A, Browning is on the board and the finance committee for Vital Voices, a program that helps women around the world improve their leadership skills.
She's also the executive champion for B of A's Global Ambassadors Program, which taps company executives to mentor businesswomen abroad. The program is a partnership with Vital Voices.
