Rusty Guinn

Rusty Guinn

Co-Founder and CEO

Rusty Guinn is co-Founder and CEO of Second Foundation Partners, LLC, and has been a contributing author to Epsilon Theory since 2017.

Before Ben and Rusty established Second Foundation, Rusty served in a variety of investment roles in several organizations. He managed and operated a $10+ billion investment business, led investment strategy for the second largest wealth management franchise in Houston, and sat on the management committee of the 6th largest public pension fund in the United States.

Most recently, Rusty was Executive Vice President over the retail and institutional asset management businesses at Salient Partners in Houston, Texas. There he oversaw the 5-year restructuring and transition of Salient’s $10 billion money management business from legacy fund-of-funds products to a dedicated real assets franchise.

He previously served as Director of Strategic Partnerships and Opportunistic Investments at the Teacher Retirement System of Texas, a $12 billion portfolio spanning public and private investments. Rusty also served as a portfolio manager for TRS’s externally managed global macro hedge fund and long-only equity portfolios. He led diligence, process development and the allocation of billions of dollars across a wide range of indirect and principal investments.

Rusty’s career also includes roles with de Guardiola Advisors, an investment bank serving the asset management industry, and Asset Management Finance, a specialized private equity investor in asset management companies.

He is a graduate of the Wharton School, and lives on a farm in Fairfield, Connecticut with wife Pam and sons Winston and Harry. He serves as a member of the Board of Directors of the Houston Youth Symphony, and with Pam has been a long-time supporter and founding Friend of the Houston Shakespeare Festival. He also serves as a member of the Easton Volunteer Fire Company in Easton, Connecticut. Rusty spends his free time smoking meat, working his apple orchard, enjoying whisky, badly butchering progressive rock drumming and jeopardizing long-term relationships through high-stakes board games.

Articles by Rusty:

A Perfect Meme

By Rusty Guinn | December 31, 2019 | 11 Comments

Every day we run The Narrative Machine on the past 24 hours of financial media to generate a list of the most linguistically-connected and narrative-central…

Office Hours – 12.19.2019

By Rusty Guinn | December 19, 2019 | Comments Off on Office Hours – 12.19.2019

Join us at 2PM ET on December 19th for the last 2019 edition of Office Hours for a lively – and live – discussion of the narrative intersection of politics and financial markets.

An End to War!

By Rusty Guinn | December 17, 2019 | 5 Comments

The Long Now wouldn’t be complete without the Long War. And as with every other component of the Long Now, its supporting memes are intensely cynical.

Epsilon Theory: A 2019 Retrospective

By Rusty Guinn | December 12, 2019 | 11 Comments

It is our second time now to turn the lens we apply to other news sources to our own creative output. Here is a Very Epsilon Theory retrospective on 2019.

One Narrative Keeps on Trucking

By Rusty Guinn | December 9, 2019 | 6 Comments

Trucking is dying and truckers are suffering along with it. The fact that the latter is the framing being chosen for the issue should pique your interest.

Mailbag: By Our Own Petard

By Rusty Guinn | December 7, 2019 | 2 Comments

We’ve gotten a lot of responses and thoughts on By Our Own Petard, so we thought we would talk about some of them in another Mailbag feature.

Credit and Debt Monitor – 11.30.2019

By Rusty Guinn | December 6, 2019 | Comments Off on Credit and Debt Monitor – 11.30.2019

Access the Powerpoint slides of this month’s ET Pro monitors here. Access the PDF version of the ET Pro monitor slides here. Access the underlying Excel data here.…

US Recession Monitor – 11.30.2019

By Rusty Guinn | December 6, 2019 | Comments Off on US Recession Monitor – 11.30.2019

Access the Powerpoint slides of this month’s ET Pro monitors here. Access the PDF version of the ET Pro monitor slides here. Access the underlying Excel data here.…

US Fiscal Policy Monitor – 11.30.2019

By Rusty Guinn | December 6, 2019 | Comments Off on US Fiscal Policy Monitor – 11.30.2019

Access the Powerpoint slides of this month’s ET Pro monitors here. Access the PDF version of the ET Pro monitor slides here. Access the underlying Excel data here.…

Trade and Tariffs Monitor – 11.30.2019

By Rusty Guinn | December 6, 2019 | Comments Off on Trade and Tariffs Monitor – 11.30.2019

Access the Powerpoint slides of this month’s ET Pro monitors here. Access the PDF version of the ET Pro monitor slides here. Access the underlying Excel data here.…