Richard M Charlton

Richard M. Charlton is the founder and Chairman Emeritus of NEPC, LLC, one of the largest independent institutional investment consulting firms in the United States. His investment career began in 1972, when he initiated Michigan Bell's pension oversight function in anticipation of the regulatory requirements of ERISA. After a subsequent assignment at AT&T, he joined Merrill Lynch Capital Markets in 1981, taking on investment-consulting responsibility for more than $25 billion in assets across a multi-state region.

When Merrill Lynch decided to exit the institutional investment-consulting business at the end of 1985, Charlton founded New England Pension Consultants (now NEPC) in 1986, reportedly converting essentially all of his existing clients to the new firm. Under his leadership over the following three decades, NEPC grew into an employee-owned, full-service advisory firm; today it serves more than 400 clients and advises on well over $1.9 trillion in assets, with offices in Boston, Atlanta, Charlotte, Chicago, Las Vegas, Portland, San Francisco, and London.

Charlton retired as chairman effective January 1, 2016, transitioning to the role of Chairman Emeritus, a position he continues to hold. He earned an undergraduate degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Detroit (College of Engineering & Science, 1965) and an M.B.A. with an emphasis in statistics and finance from Wayne State University (1972). The University of Detroit Mercy has also recognized him with an honorary Doctor of Letters.

In 2019, Charlton made a $3 million gift — described as the largest single gift from a living alumnus to the university's $100 million campaign — to establish the Charlton Center for Responsible Investing in the University of Detroit Mercy's College of Business Administration. Citing his 16 years living in Detroit and awareness of "a significant talent pool that often goes untapped" among minorities and women, he designed the center to recruit underrepresented students into the investment field through internships, employment pathways, a speaker series, student-run investment programs, and support for professional certifications such as the CFA.

• Operates in institutional investment consulting, not venture capital: NEPC helps "governments, institutions, families and individuals preserve and grow their capital across different asset classes and market cycles."
• Core services span asset allocation, investment policy formulation, performance measurement, investment-manager research and selection, and discretionary (OCIO) portfolio management.
• Client base is institutional and long-horizon: defined benefit and defined contribution plans, endowments, foundations, trusts, public and corporate plans, Taft-Hartley, health & welfare, insurance, and high-net-worth families.
• Charlton's personal philanthropic thesis centers on "responsible investing" and broadening access to the investment profession for underrepresented groups — "This initiative is focused on establishing additional avenues of opportunity."