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- Our Team
Our Team
Our team is committed to treating you as a partner in this process by respecting your need and capacity for knowledge, not by exploiting your emotions or lack of information.
Phil Jonckheer, Managing Director & Chief Financial Officer
Jeff Troutner, Managing Director & Chief Investment Officer
Katie Calagui, Chief Executive Officer
T.J. Troutner, Chief Relationship Officer
Jason Zahorenko, Portfolio Administration Sr. Manager & Chief Compliance Officer
David Wootton, Client Services Manager
Kari Troutner, Marketing & Business Development Manager
Judy Arntz, Portfolio Administrator
Phil Jonckheer, Managing Director & Chief Financial Officer
Phil graduated from Harvard University with a B.A. in General Studies (cum laude) and earned a MBA in Finance and a Masters in Administration and Policy Analysis from Stanford University. He is also a chartered financial analyst (CFA) and has been a student of finance since 1978. He began his journey on the investment advisory track as a financial analyst with Brown-Forman in Louisville, Kentucky, after which he worked as a portfolio manager for Kingsley, Jennison, McNulty and Morse, an investment advisor in San Francisco. He was a partner and director of Ernst & Young’s West Region Corporate Finance Group before joining Dynamic Funds Management (DFM) in 1991.
Phil’s interest in financial economics was formed at business school, where he was taught by luminaries such as William Sharpe, a Nobel laureate and an architect of modern portfolio theory. His exchanges with Daniel Kahneman, the first psychologist to receive the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences, helped Phil develop a broader awareness of how human behavior affects wealth. That knowledge base guided him as he helped build DFM, which merged with TAM Asset Management in 2007 to form Equius Partners.
Phil is a board member for four nonprofit organizations: Alchemia, serving the developmentally disabled through the arts; Project Redwood, a partnership founded by his business school class that applies venture philanthropy to organizations alleviating poverty; No Bully, which develops students’ social and emotional intelligence; and Grace’s Kids, providing nutritional, educational, and medical support to children in Africa. He also is chairman of the Equius Foundation.
Phil is blessed with three children. He is a master swimmer. Unlike his Dutch ancestors, he has learned to limit his involvement in tulipomania to growing bulbs, not trading them.
Jeff Troutner, Managing Director & Chief Investment Officer
Jeff majored in finance and graduated from Indiana University with a B.S. in Business Administration. He began his career in the financial services industry in 1980 in Fort Wayne, Indiana, as a stockbroker with a local brokerage firm, Headford & Company. He later joined Shearson Lehman Brothers (now Smith Barney) as a financial consultant, where over the next seven years he evaluated, recommended, and monitored independent investment managers for corporate retirement plans and individual investors. He was one of the first stockbrokers at a major Wall Street firm to specialize in placing client assets with independent, fee-based money managers, and he rose to the top ranks of Shearson financial consultants nationwide as a result.
Jeff joined a Cincinnati-based money manager in 1988 and moved to San Francisco to market their “tactical asset allocation” services through financial intermediaries on the West Coast. After two years, he left to offer marketing and strategic planning services to other independent advisors, before founding TAM Asset Management in 1992. Jeff began working with Phil at Dynamic Funds Management in 2000 before formally merging TAM and DFM to form Equius Partners in 2007.
As an investment professional, Jeff has come full circle. In college, he studied the principles of modern portfolio theory and efficient markets (the underlying foundation of asset class investing). He then spent more than ten years evaluating nationally recognized investment management firms as they attempted to disprove these principles. This experience, as well as witnessing “regression to the mean” (the tendency of above-average-performing managers to fall to average or below) firsthand at the Cincinnati-based advisory firm, convinced him that active management was consistently failing long-term investors. The founding of TAM Asset Management was the result of affirming and passionately embracing the principles of modern portfolio theory and asset class investment strategies for the benefit of his clients.
Jeff lives in San Rafael and is married to his high school sweetheart, Kathy. He has four grown children—Katie, T.J., Kari, and Kasey—and enjoys an active life that includes mountain biking on Mt. Tamalpais, sea kayaking on the San Francisco Bay, snowboarding and backpacking in the Sierras, and scuba diving wherever the water is warm.
Katie Calagui, Chief Executive Officer
Katie joined Equius Partners in 2008. A scientist at heart, she earned a Bachelor of Arts in biology from the University of San Diego. She started her career in biological research and then joined the pharmaceutical industry as a project manager, facilitating cross-functional teams in the development and execution of various drug development projects.
At Equius Partners, Katie creatively applies her research, project management, and strategic skills in support of all aspects of our mission to provide our clients with a successful, rewarding investment experience. She quickly acquired the “Equius passion” through her respect for the firm’s scientific and disciplined investing practices and her appreciation of how our approach reduces stress and anxiety in our clients’ lives.
Katie lives with her husband, Bob, and sons, Aiden and Cody, in San Rafael, where they enjoy a relaxed life that includes frequent meals with friends and family and exploring the great outdoors of the San Francisco Bay Area.
T.J. Troutner, Chief Relationship Officer
T.J. joined Equius Partners in 2006 after earning his Bachelor of Science in aeronautical science from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott, Arizona, where he was awarded his commercial pilot instrument rating for single- and multi-engine airplanes.
Intrigued by the Equius investment philosophy, T.J. learned the foundations of asset class investing while managing our Operations department. His pilot-style attention to detail served us brilliantly as he further streamlined and upgraded our client servicing platform and internal procedures.
T.J.’s passion for our business led him to immerse himself in the academics of finance by enrolling in Golden Gate University’s Master of Science program in finance. With his broader and deeper appreciation of all aspects of our business, T.J. became ideally suited to fill the role of director of client services.
T.J. lives in San Rafael, where he is committed to living a balanced lifestyle. When not at work, he's likely to be found running Stinson Beach with his lab, Beau; mountain biking Marin County’s trails; snowboarding the Sierras with his father; or showing friends and family the beauty of Northern California from 10,000 feet.
Jason Zahorenko, Portfolio Administration Sr. Manager & Chief Compliance Officer
Jason joined Equius Partners in 2007. After earning a Bachelor of Science in finance from Arizona State University, he began his career with Charles Schwab & Co., Inc. There he was tasked with coordinating trading in the firm’s mutual fund supermarket, “OneSource.”
At Equius Partners, Jason oversees database management, quarterly report preparation, and the preparation of investment plans. He also reviews portfolios on a continual basis to ensure that client portfolios adhere to their stated asset allocation. Jason also heads our compliance efforts.
Jason is a native of Marin County and enjoys cycling and other outdoor activities in his spare time. He has participated in a number of cycling events, including one that's had him crossing the great state of Iowa in each of the previous six summers.
David Wootton, Client Services Manager
David worked as an intern at Equius Partners during the summer of 2008. After earning a Bachelor of Arts in economics from the University of California, Los Angeles, he officially joined the Equius Partners team in September 2009.
While a student at UCLA, David focused on the behavioral aspects of economics and investing. It is his interest in human behavior that immediately drew him to Equius’s investment philosophy and the concept of reducing stress for our clients through discipline and a structured asset class investment strategy. David currently assists Jason Zahorenko in all aspects of operations and administration at Equius.
David lives in San Rafael, where he enjoys an active lifestyle. In his spare time, he can typically be found playing soccer at the Mill Valley Community Center; mountain biking on Mt. Tamalpais; or training for the Dipsea, the oldest trail race in America.
