2022 was one of the most challenging years in many members’ careers. The speed of inflation, interest rate increases, and market declines has been unprecedented. Perhaps the greatest burden of all on members, their employers and their clients has been the uncertainty which continues to persist.

Throughout this backdrop of uncertainty, CFA Society New York has rallied around our members, in large part, driven by the hard work, resilience, and dedication of both our staff and volunteer leaders. Our world-class content and invaluable networking events are helping our members navigate these uncertain times with both timely educational content and access to their peer community.

2022-23 MEMBERSHIP, SOCIETY OVERVIEW
We are advancing through the new membership year with a successful 2022-23 Membership Renewal Campaign that so far has produced a retention rate of 87.1%. CFA charterholder membership at our Society is slightly ahead of last year, with 10,540 members as of March 2023.

We continue to be a fiscally healthy organization, having met our budget expectations for the fiscal year with healthy reserves. These foundations are important to future organizational longevity to continue to provide high quality offerings to our members.

2022 EVENTS
Due to the rise of the omicron variant and the legacy of the pandemic, we started 2022 with some exceptionally strong virtual content via webinars. Notably, The Annual Benjamin Graham Conference in June offered world class content and star speakers including David Einhorn.

During the spring we heard the volunteers and members who were anxious to come back in person and re-launched in person events in July. The enthusiastic response from members who joined the Midyear Market Outlook on July 13 was inspiring. However, that event attendance was lower than it was in the pre-COVID era and that has been the general trend for subsequent in-person events. We believe a whole host of factors slowed down return to events and networking, including back to the office mandates employers prioritized time spent in offices.

In September, we hit a high point for the year when the Global Policymaker Series and Asset Owner Series put the convening power of CFA Society New York on display. Three heads of sovereign African countries, members of the C-suite of multilateral development banks and dozens of other asset owners came together for a two day event to discuss their ESG plans and challenges during Climate Week 2022.

In October, CFA Society New York hosted its marquee event for 2022 at the Annual Dinner. We had an elegant night at the Mandarin Oriental where awarded Andrew Golden, CFA, President of Princeton University Investment Company with the Irving Kahn Lifetime Achievement Award, and had Saira Malik, CIO of Nuveen deliver the keynote address focused on cognitive diversity.

GLOBAL PRESENCE
We continue to foster efforts toward improving the Society’s reach and capabilities and facilitate a strategic furtherance of our global presence and footprint. We continue to build our live-streaming views across CFA Society New York’s 2022 programming, comprising a global audience.

In FY22, the portal offerings continue to include access to livestreamed and archived recordings of AOS Virtual Keynotes and a range of other diverse content offers – podcasts, curated clips, and full-event recordings alike. We also bolstered our global standing as CFA Institute’s preeminent local society by partnering with sister societies from around the world to continue to produce content for the financial investment community. Similar global efforts are planned for FY23, including event-organization endeavors with societies based in Latin America, Africa, and Asia.

2023 OUTLOOK
As we look towards 2023 and beyond, we are optimistic about the future of our Society. While we believe the world may not look quite as it did pre-pandemic, we know that the necessity and interest for investment professionals in continually developing new and honing existing skills is certain to persist, especially given how quickly the market continues to evolve. We will steadily pursue this mission and continue to be a forum for thought leadership and education, not only in 2023, but also in the years ahead. Our exceptional group of volunteer leaders and staff give us utmost confidence in our ability to see our vision through and make good on the Society’s mission.

Professional learning and career development represent two prominent areas of continued focus – underpinned, as always, by a commitment to sustain the highest standards in member experience, opportunity, and value. We will continue to offer our programming in a hybrid format moving forward, as well as having more in-person and networking events. We’re sure that lessons learned will allow us to take the best-of approach to service our members.

We look forward to the new year, ready to leverage our historical foundation and current position to help lead the industry into the future with new ideas and a fresh outlook.