Arab Press

بالشعب و للشعب
Friday, Jun 05, 2026

Investor who made offensive sexual comments at summit loses $600 million contract in backlash

Investor who made offensive sexual comments at summit loses $600 million contract in backlash

A Michigan government official called Ken Fisher's comments “completely unacceptable."

The state of Michigan has pulled $600 million of its pension fund from wealth management firm Fisher Investments after the company’s founder and chairman made crude and sexually explicit comments during a fireside chat at the Tiburon CEO Summit in San Francisco this week.

In a letter Thursday, Michigan Chief Investment Officer Jon Braeutigam informed the state’s investment board that its bureau of investments, housed under the state Treasury Department, had terminated its relationship with Fisher Investments because of CEO Ken Fisher’s “completely unacceptable comments.”

During a moderated keynote discussion Tuesday with Chip Roame, managing partner at Tiburon Strategic Advisors, Fisher compared his wealth management strategy to picking up women for sex, according to summit attendees who recounted what they heard in interviews with The Washington Post. Fisher spoke of doing acid and his belief that charities are immoral. He also made crude comments about genitalia, attendees said, and mentioned financier Jeffrey Epstein, who was indicted on federal sex-trafficking charges earlier this year before dying by suicide in prison.

Despite a Tiburon policy that requires summit attendees to keep private what they hear and discuss there, three CEOs publicly shared their accounts of what Fisher said in the interest of exposing his behavior and holding the self-proclaimed “self-made multibillionaire” accountable.

Alex Chalekian, founder and chief executive of Lake Avenue Financial in Pasadena, Calif., came forward first, posting a video to Twitter hours after Fisher’s remarks. Chalekian called the fireside chat a “true debacle” and said Fisher’s words were “absolutely horrifying.” Rachel Robasciotti, founder and chief executive of wealth management firm Robasciotti and Philipson in San Francisco, and Sonya Dreizler, a speaker and consultant to financial services firms, publicly confirmed Chalekian’s account online and in media reports.

They criticized the wealth management industry’s lack of diversity and cited incidents like Fisher’s Tiburon remarks as evidence of why women and people of color do not feel welcome.

“When you have power and you get onstage to share your worldview, and when your worldview includes women as sexual objects … that is irresponsible,” Robasciotti said in an interview with The Post. “You’re peddling your worldview, and people are adopting it.”

Amid the backlash, Fisher was initially defiant in an interview with Bloomberg, defending his remarks by saying he had “given a lot of talks, a lot of times, in a lot of places and said stuff like this and never gotten that type of response.” He also claimed attendees had mischaracterized what he said and were being unfair.

Fisher, 68, later issued a formal apology.

Roame denounced Fisher’s remarks and said he would never again be invited to speak at Tiburon. He praised Chalekian for speaking out.

Fisher had been previously honored at the Tiburon CEO Summit and has written 11 books, regularly writes newspaper columns on finance and has a net worth of $3.7 billion. He founded Fisher Investments in 1979, and it has grown into the world’s largest Registered Investment Adviser, managing $100 billion as of February, with $1 billion in revenue.

The firm manages private, individual clients and institutions, like the state of Michigan’s pension fund. The State of Michigan Retirement Systems has more than $70 billion in assets. Fisher Investments was responsible for managing $600 million of the retirement systems’ funds.

Braeutigam said in his letter to the investment board that Michigan’s Bureau of Investment decided to fire Fisher Investments after learning of Fisher’s remarks from news reports.

“ All were in unanimous agreement that prompt termination is the correct course of action,” the letter said. “There is no excuse to not treat everyone with dignity and respect. We have high expectations of our managers (and staff), not just with regards to returns but also in how they exhibit integrity and respect to all individuals.”

Fisher Investments had managed state funds for 15 years, Braeutigam said in the letter, writing that the firm’s “performance has been good (beating the S&P 1500)." He added that his staff had not "previously witnessed or been aware of any type of similar comments along the lines of the founder’s recent statements.”

“In our opinion, this history does not out-weigh the inappropriateness of the comments made by the founder,” Braeutigam wrote.

The state of Michigan’s in-house investment team will now manage the retirement funds for state employees and public school teachers, state officials said.

Newsletter

Related Articles

Arab Press
0:00
0:00
Close
Japanese Technology Firm Fujitsu Launches Advanced Artificial Intelligence Tool for Corporate Disclosures
South Africa Officially Launches Nationwide Campaign for Highly Contested Local Government Elections
United Kingdom Commits Additional Funding for Unexploded Ordnance Clearance in Laos
Singapore Announces Stringent New Greenhouse Gas Regulations for Commercial Cooling Systems
Cambodia and Thailand Hold High-Level Border Security Talks at United Nations Headquarters
Myanmar Military Government and China Sign Major Agreement to Upgrade Media and Cultural Cooperation
Knife Attack at Swiss Train Station Leaves Three Injured in Suspected Act of Domestic Terrorism
Transnational Extortion Gang Threatens Canadian Police With Army of One Thousand Armed Operatives
Australia Imposes Forty-Two-Day Quarantine on Cruise Ship Passengers Following Deadly Hantavirus Outbreak
International Monetary Fund Unlocks Seven Hundred Million United States Dollars for Sri Lanka Following Economic Reforms
Australia Launches Record One Point Four Billion Dollar Lawsuit Against Chemical Giant 3M Over Contamination
China and Canada Foreign Ministers Meet in Ottawa in Effort to Stabilize Strained Diplomatic Ties
Indonesia Demands Urgent United Nations Security Council Reform Amid Escalating Global Conflicts
Extreme Weather Patterns Trigger Severe Drought in Madagascar and Destructive Flooding in East Africa
Indian State of Karnataka Faces Political Upheaval as Chief Minister Siddaramaiah Abruptly Resigns
Philippines and Japan Reaffirm Defense Ties as Crucial for Indo-Pacific Regional Stability
Norway Joins French Nuclear Deterrence Initiative in Major Shift for European Security Architecture
Global Critical Mineral Alliances Expand as Western Nations Move to Counter Chinese Supply Dominance
United States Imposes Fifty Percent Tariffs on Mexican Steel and Aluminum Ahead of Trade Pact Review
European Union and China Head Toward Major Trade Conflict Over Clean Technology Exports
United States Economic Growth Severely Downgraded to One Point Six Percent as Stagflation Fears Mount
World Health Organization Warns Central African Ebola Epidemic is Outpacing Containment Efforts
United States Treasury Department Conditions Sanctions Relief on Reopening of the Strait of Hormuz
Iranian Air Defenses Intercept and Destroy United States Military Drone Over Bushehr Province
Iranian Armed Forces Launch Ballistic Missiles Toward Unspecified Targets Prompting Regional Condemnation
United Nations Secretary-General Warns Global Order Facing Highest Level of Conflict Since 1945
Israel Issues Sweeping Evacuation Orders in Southern Lebanon Amid Intensified Hezbollah Conflict
Russia Announces Systemic Military Strikes Targeting Ukrainian Defense and Energy Infrastructure
United States and Iranian Negotiators Reach Draft Agreement to Extend Ceasefire and Resume Nuclear Talks
United Nations Security Council Deeply Divided Over United States Capture of Venezuelan President
US and Iran Exchange Direct Military Strikes Amid Fragile Gulf Ceasefire
World Health Organization Warns of Catastrophic Ebola Outbreak in DR Congo
Russia Threatens New Wave of Strikes on Ukrainian Infrastructure and Embassies
Scientists Warn Atlantic Ocean Currents Could Collapse Faster Than Projected
Anthropic Reaches $900 Billion Valuation in Historic AI Funding Round
Washington Imposes Crippling Sanctions on Iranian Maritime Authority
Japan and the Philippines Initiate Strategic Intelligence-Sharing Pact
Microsoft Deploys Autonomous Computer-Using AI Agents to Global Markets
Anthropic Secures $45 Billion Compute Infrastructure Agreement With SpaceX
U.S. Director of National Intelligence Resigns Amid Administration Shakeup
Micron Technology Crosses Trillion-Dollar Valuation Amid Unprecedented Hardware Demand
Canada and Germany Finalize Historic Long-Term LNG Export Agreement
China Expands International Travel Restrictions on Domestic AI Researchers
Japan Approves Sweeping Overhaul of National Intelligence Apparatus
Global Airlines Scramble Logistics as Middle East Airspace Remains Fractured
Japan's Naphtha Imports Plunge 47 Percent Amid Strait of Hormuz Closure
Global Crude Prices Retreat Below $96 as Gulf Tensions Momentarily Ease
Generative AI Outperforms Human Baselines in Landmark Global Creativity Study
NASA Partners With Private Aerospace to Unveil Permanent Lunar Base Architecture
South Korean Equity Markets Surge on Next-Generation Memory Chip Frenzy
×