Jenn Bender

director of research, global equity beta, State Street Global Advisors

Jennifer Bender, Ph.D, is a senior managing director at State Street Global Advisors and director of research for the global equity beta solutions team. In this role, Jennifer is responsible for leading the research at SSGA across key areas of index investing.  These research areas include core beta, smart beta, ESG and thematic investing.

Jennifer joined SSGA in 2014 and since then, has been responsible for promoting the thought leadership of SSGA’s indexing capabilities.  Previously, Jennifer was a vice president in the index and analytics research teams at MSCI. Jennifer began her career as an economist at DRI in 1996 and has held research roles at State Street Associates and Harvard University.

Jennifer holds a Master of Science and Ph.D degrees in economics from Brandeis University. Her work has been published extensively in industry-leading journals and books such as the Institutional Investor Journals and Wiley Finance Series. She is on the editorial boards for The Journal of Portfolio Management, The Journal of Systematic Investing, The Journal of Beta Investment Strategies, and The Journal of Impact and ESG Investing.