Ramaswamy’s Strive Hires Ex-Treasury Lawyer as General Counsel

Strive Asset Management, an investment firm co-founded by Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, has named former Treasury Department lawyer Alexandra Gaiser as general counsel.

Gaiser was most recently director of regulatory affairs at bitcoin-focused financial technology startup River Financial Inc. For about two years under former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, Gaiser held roles including executive secretary and senior adviser to the general counsel.

“We’re confident in the team we have assembled to navigate the coming years of company growth,” Strive said in a statement. Strive also named Donald McArdle, who spent nearly 16 years in positions at Boston-based State Street Global Advisors Inc., as its new chief compliance officer.

McArdle and Gaiser joined Strive in September when the firm crossed the $1 billion asset mark. Ramaswamy, who touted Strive as an investment alternative to asset management giant BlackRock Inc., stepped down as executive chairman this year. His representatives claim he no longer has an active role with the firm.

Gaiser replaces Rachel Paulose, a former litigation partner at DLA Piper in Minneapolis who also once served as Minnesota’s top federal prosecutor. Gaiser began her career at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld in Washington.

McArdle succeeds interim compliance chief Robert Roach Jr., who as a consultant helped launch Strive’s compliance team. Roach will continue to serve as a senior compliance adviser to the Columbus, Ohio-based firm, whose head of corporate governance remains attorney Justin Danhof.

Strive also acknowledged changes involving two other staffers. Matthew Kopko, a former Cooley associate who joined Strive earlier this year as its head of proxy services, now has the title of senior vice president for legal and compliance. Corey Skerl, another lawyer who had been Strive’s director of corporate governance, left the firm last month.

Strive is seeking to move beyond “woke” investment practices to put an emphasis on “shareholder primacy,” Bloomberg Law reported earlier this month. Strive has also recently sought to defend itself in a lawsuit filed by Joyce Rosely, its former co-head of international sales and distribution.

Court filings in the Rosely case show that John Coghlan, a partner at Ellis George Cipollone O’Brien Annaguey in Washington, where the firm opened an office last year after hiring ex-Trump White House counsel Pat Cipollone, is representing Strive. Coghlan also previously worked in the Trump administration’s Justice Department and as an associate White House counsel.