Howard Matlin

Howard A. Matlin is the Chief Financial Officer of Kelso & Company, one of the oldest and most established middle-market private equity firms in the United States. He joined Kelso in 1997 as a Senior Advisory Partner and serves as a Managing Director and CFO, overseeing the firm's financial operations, accounting, compliance, and internal administration. Kelso, founded on the employee-ownership principles of Louis Kelso and operating as a dedicated private equity platform since 1980, has invested roughly $15 billion of capital across more than 130 investments, with an emphasis on partnership, alignment of interest (roughly 15% average GP commitment in its most recent funds), and long-term value creation.

Before Kelso, Matlin spent eight years as Chief Financial Officer and a Principal at Butler Capital Corporation, an investment firm focused on leveraged buyouts. Earlier in his career he spent about nine years in a series of financial-management positions at Deloitte & Touche, Colgate-Palmolive, and Riverbank America, building the accounting and financial-controls background that underpins his current role.

Matlin earned an M.B.A. from St. John's University in 1979, where he graduated Beta Gamma Sigma, and a B.A. in Political Science from Queens College in 1976. He is a Certified Public Accountant and a member of both the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and the New York State Society of Certified Public Accountants.

Beyond the firm, Matlin has been active in the private-equity finance community. He was a founding board member of the New York Chapter of the Private Equity CFO Association and is a former member of The George Washington University School of Business Board of Advisors.

• Note on role: Howard Matlin is Kelso's CFO — a finance, operations, and compliance leader — rather than an angel investor or a deal-sourcing partner. The "Angel Investors / Seed Round" classification in the source stub does not match his actual role or Kelso's strategy; it has been corrected here based on primary sources.
• Firm strategy: Kelso pursues control-oriented middle-market private equity — leveraged buyouts, recapitalizations, and growth-capital transactions — across a diversified set of North American industries.
• Alignment of interest: Kelso's stated philosophy centers on partnership and alignment; all employees commit substantial personal capital, and the GP has committed roughly 15% of capital in its three most recent funds — a hallmark of how the firm approaches deals.
• Long-term orientation: The firm emphasizes long-term value creation and durable relationships with management teams, reflected in a ~20-year average tenure among its active investment partners.

Portfolio-level deals are executed by Kelso's investment partners rather than by Matlin as CFO; no individual angel/seed investments are attributable to him in public sources. At the firm level, Kelso has made 130+ investments and deployed ~$15 billion of capital across four decades in the North American middle market. (Specific current and historical portfolio companies are listed on Kelso's website and on PitchBook, but none are personally attributable to Howard Matlin.)