Bradford Briner

Bradford B. Briner is the North Carolina State Treasurer and chairman of the North Carolina Investment Authority Board. He was sworn in on January 1, 2025, after being elected in 2024 with more than 52% of the vote. In his current role, he oversees the Department of State Treasurer, whose responsibilities include state pension assets, cash management, the State Health Plan, debt-related functions and unclaimed property.

Before entering public office, Briner spent more than a decade at Willett Advisors, working there from 2012 to 2023 and most recently serving as Co-Chief Investment Officer. Willett manages the philanthropic and personal investment assets of Michael Bloomberg. Axios reported in 2017 that Briner, who had overseen natural resources and real estate, became co-CIO alongside Andrew Mulderry, with Briner overseeing public-markets investments and operations.

Earlier in his career, Briner held roles at Morgan Creek Capital, UNC Management Company, ArcLight Capital and Goldman Sachs. His official state biography says he graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill as a Morehead Scholar with a degree in economics with distinction, and earned an MBA with distinction from Harvard Business School.

Briner has also served on institutional boards and committees. His official biography lists service on the Phillips Exeter Academy Board of Trustees and as chairman of its investment committee, and prior service on the UNC-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees, the Boston Omaha Corporation board and the North Carolina Debt Affordability Advisory Committee.

• Briner’s current public-market mandate is institutional rather than angel or seed investing. The North Carolina Investment Authority manages programs for the North Carolina Retirement Systems and related public funds.
• The NCIA pension program’s asset-class categories include corporate equity, real asset equity, investment-grade fixed income, non-investment-grade credit, cash and multi-strategy investments.
• Corporate equity can include public and private equity globally, including buyout, venture capital, growth equity, special situations, hedge-fund-like structures, co-investments and direct equity.
• Real asset equity includes real estate, infrastructure, natural resources, commodities and related operating companies.
• Willett Advisors states that its objective is “long-term capital appreciation” through a diversified investment portfolio, using selected third-party managers and direct investments across public markets, hedge funds, private equity and credit, real assets and direct investments.
• In a 2025 Morehead-Cain interview, Briner framed his public-investment priority as improving North Carolina’s investment performance, saying the pension fund’s underperformance represented “one-to-two-percent-a-year difference, times $130 billion every year.”