Aaron Knapik

Background

About Aaron Knapik

Growing up as a farm kid just outside of Elk Island National Park in Alberta Canada, I learned from my family both the value of both hard work and also the importance of maintaining a strong moral compass. I am most proud of my early volunteer work with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and becoming an accomplished freestyle wrestler, throughout high school in Lamont and at the University of Alberta where I graduated with a Bachelor of Commerce degree. Although I am still a small town Alberta boy at heart I have spent almost all my adult life abroad working in more than 30 countries; initially across Europe, Asia and in New York and eventually settling in the Caribbean. Beginning my finance career as an investment advisor at Royal Bank of Canada in Calgary in RBC moved me back offshore to Barbados as a discretionary investment manager, then promoting me to take care of their largest clients and eventually to lead their institutional sales efforts, where I excelled. Between signing on new clients I was able to complete by MBA, flying back and forth to Manchester Business School and writing my exams in London. My largest client Placer Dome, at the time the fourth largest gold miner in the world, recruited me to run their Treasury and then in 2006 Placer Dome was acquired by Barrick Gold, I was headhunted to join the Dart family office in the Cayman Islands. In twelve successful years with the Dart Group as a generalist, I applied all I learned for one of the largest, most interesting family offices focused on a concentrated portfolio of value equity positions, FX and distressed debt, both sovereign and corporate. The highlight of which was the Greek international debt transaction, which I lead from concept to successful completion. In 2018 I joined the Somerston Group, an exciting 170-year old Jersey based family office with a very forward thinking principal and board. Responsible for Ventures and Treasury, I transitioned our Private Equity portfolio to largely late-stage, disruptive tech positions for which we are realising great success. In 2023, I took on additional responsibilities as CFO of Trans Pacific Networks, an entity Somerston controls that is building a submarine telecommunications cable across the Pacific. Watching my two young-adult children spread their wings and excel provides me my largest internal reward, and I continue to challenge myself and travel, having visited 76 countries thus far.