Michael G. Messner

Michael G. Messner is a Professor of Practice within the Scheller College of Business at Georgia Institute of Technology.

After graduating from Ga Tech in 1976, Mike worked in the railroad industry.  He supervised track maintenance in Philadelphia for Conrail.  And later, he was Director of Equipment Management for the Boston and Maine Rail Corporation.

Mike migrated into the finance industry, taking an analyst position with the Pioneer Mutual Funds in downtown Boston.  In the early 1990’s he moved to NYC and worked at Lazard Freres.

After Lazard, he co-founded Seminole Management Co, Inc., an equity hedge fund. As the Chief Investment Officer Mike successfully steered Seminole through both bull and bear markets, focusing on capital preservation during downturns. Since inception through August 2018, Seminole had gross annualized return of 19.5% before fees, including a +1.8% gross return in 2008 when the S&P 500 was down 37%. He led Seminole to positive gross returns in 21 out of 23 years. Seminole peak assets totaled over $3 billion.

After winding down Seminole in 2018, Mike became a Professor of Practice at Ga Tech.  Mike teaches Equity Investing at Scheller College of Business, Infrastructure Finance in Civil Engineering, oversees a VIP project, Equity Research Boutique

Through their family’s Speedwell Foundation, he and his wife, Jenny, have been involved in various philanthropic efforts nationwide and for Charleston and Atlanta focused on urban parks and education. These included Redfields to Greenfields research at Ga Tech, analyzing the effects of acquiring financially distressed properties (real estate “in the red”) in major U.S. cities and converting them into green space: public parks and adjacent land “banked” for future sustainable development.

Mr. Messner received a B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1975 and a B.S. in Civil Engineering from Georgia Institute of Technology in 1976. He attended graduate school at M.I.T. and received an M.S. in 1980. Mr. Messner is a Chartered Financial Analyst.