Leadership
Experienced private lending specialists dedicated to flexible credit solutions for the middle market
Robert Kiesel
CEO
More about Rob
Daniel Wise
Director
More about Dan
Lowery Thomas
Director of Business Development
More about Lowery
Joe Salameh
Advisor to Mercatus Finance
More about Joe
Robert Kiesel
CEO
- Rob has more than 25 years of experience providing middle-market companies with the flexible financing they need across industries, across the capital structure, and in partnership with both sponsored and unsponsored enterprises.
- He was previously chief investment officer at Pillar Life Insurance and global head of credit at alternative credit advisor GB Capital. He was also a partner at Fifth Street Capital and has held various positions at Intermediate Capital Group and ORIX USA.
- Rob earned a BA in economics from Yale University and an MBA from the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University.
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Daniel Wise
Director
- Dan has facilitated and managed more than $2 billion in capital for enterprises across many industries in the past decade and a half. In previous roles, he focused on special situations investing and private credit at Marblegate Asset Management, Credit Suisse, and Marquette Financial. Dan was also a founder and managing principal at Darby Investments.
- Before his career in finance, Dan served in the US Army for eight years as an infantry officer, Army Ranger and psychological operations specialist, including two combat tours in Iraq.
- Dan holds a BBA in finance from The George Washington University and an MBA from Columbia Business School.
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Lowery Thomas
Director of Business Development
- Lowery is a client-centric business development professional known for consistently supporting borrowers in achieving their capital objectives. He has sourced and executed more than 125 sponsored and unsponsored transactions. Before joining Mercatus, he was investment director at Lighter Capital, where he spearheaded deal sourcing and execution across the Southeast, Midwest, and Mid-Atlantic regions.
- Lowery’s expertise in private credit is complemented by previous venture capital investor roles and operational experience building and scaling a market-leading technology company—experience that helps him understand and creatively address the funding needs of Mercatus clients.
- Lowery holds a BBA in risk management from the Terry College of Business at the University of Georgia, where he was a four-year letterwinner on the men’s golf team.
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Joe Salameh
Advisor to Mercatus Finance
- Joe is a managing director at Arena Investors, LP. He is adept at creating customized financing solutions that can harness the debt or equity capital structures or both.
- Before joining Arena, Joe was a managing director at Silver Swan Capital, a special-situations private equity firm focused on opportunistic equity, debt, and hybrid capital solutions, and previously was a vice president at Citigroup. Joe has sourced, structured, and managed investments in a wide variety of sectors including industrial agriculture, consumer products, pharmaceuticals, life sciences, logistics, and others.
- Joe holds a BA in economics from Cornell University and an MBA from Columbia University.
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