Michael Milken

Milken Institute

Named one of the '75 Most Influential People of the 21st Century' by Esquire magazine, Michael Milken has driven social change with a consistent focus on disrupting - and improving - the status quo. He is recognized as an innovator in access to capital as evidenced by his more than four decades of support of minority entrepreneurship. He is chairman of the Milken Institute, a non-profit, non-partisan economic think tank that gather more than 4,000 thought leaders and decision makers from some 50 nations every year in Los Angeles. The Los Angeles Times wrote, "the conference is about expanding minds as well as wallets." Bloomberg TV called it "The conference to go to." He is credited with revolutionizing the capital markets, expanding access to capital and thereby breaking up the “old boys’ network” that controlled financing. He helped finance Reginald Lewis’ takeover of TLC Beatrice thereby making Lewis the first Black to own and lead a billion-dollar enterprise. Importantly, it was his financing of Lewis that opened the door for other people of color to receive financing from a closed investment banking community. Today, the Milken Institute’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion initiative is a leader in advocating for the utilization of diverse managers. It has developed three informative white papers -- Inclusive Capitalism: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Asset Management, The Path to Inclusive Capitalism: An Asset Owner Guide for Investment Portfolios and Inclusive Capitalism: Seven Strategies for Specific Action in Asset Management.