Heinz Werner Rapp

Dr. Heinz-Werner Rapp is one of the best-known investment strategists in German-speaking Europe. He joined the FERI Group in 1995 as Head of Portfolio Management, became a Managing Director in 2003, and was appointed to FERI's Management Board (Vorstand) in September 2006. From 2006 until the end of 2023 he served as Chief Executive of FERI AG and Chief Investment Officer of the FERI Group, with overall responsibility for the firm's investment strategy and asset allocation across a business that today manages roughly €60 billion for more than 300 families and 200 institutional clients.

Rapp studied economics at the University of Mannheim, where he also earned his doctorate summa cum laude with a dissertation on psychologically influenced investor behavior — an early foray into what is now called behavioral finance. Before joining FERI he worked for an international investment house. Over his career he has authored numerous books and specialist articles on behavioral finance, nonlinear dynamics and complexity theory, and has become a frequent commentator and conference speaker on markets and macroeconomics.

In 2016 he founded the FERI Cognitive Finance Institute, FERI's strategic research unit and "think tank," built around his proprietary "Cognitive Finance" framework that analyzes markets across six knowledge domains (money, nature, politics, society, technology and economics). In May 2023 he handed the CIO role to his successor, Dr. Marcel V. Lähn, while remaining a Management Board member responsible for Investment Controlling and Sustainable Finance and continuing to lead the Cognitive Finance Institute. He has also been a member of the Executive Committee of the MLP Group, FERI's parent.

• Operates as an institutional, multi-asset investor, not a venture/seed backer — the natural client is a foundation, institution or wealthy family, not a startup.
• Allocates across equities, fixed income, private markets/private equity, real estate, commodities and digital assets, with a notable emphasis on alternative investments (FERI and MLP together manage roughly €18bn in alternatives).
• Anchors decisions in his "Cognitive Finance" theory — combining behavioral finance, complexity theory and nonlinear market dynamics to anticipate structural, long-horizon trends rather than short-term trades.
• Strong personal focus on macro/thematic strategy and sustainable finance, using the Cognitive Finance Institute as an "innovative ideas laboratory and strategic think tank" for entrepreneurs, investors and asset owners.