Malawi RPCV Michael Gorham to head trading program at IIT's Stuart Graduate School of Business
Ex-Merc VP to head trading program at IIT
June 8, 2004
BY DAVID ROEDER Business Reporter
A top regulator of the futures markets is coming home to Chicago to lead the Illinois Institute of Technology program that teaches trading skills.
Michael Gorham, 59, has been named director of the Center for Financial Markets, part of IIT's Stuart Graduate School of Business. The center runs one of the nation's most prestigious degree programs focusing on capital markets.
Gorham has been director of market oversight for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the government agency that oversees derivatives trading. He starts at IIT July 15.
He has worked for the CFTC since 2002, when he joined the agency in a role it created to implement a major revision of laws on futures trading. Gorham was involved in the approval of new exchanges and contracts and in investigations of possible market abuse.
The announcement represents a homecoming because Gorham worked for 18 years for the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, where he held vice presidencies in product development, commodity marketing and other areas.
Gorham said the IIT job is a "tremendous opportunity'' given rapid changes in how trading is conducted. "This is an exciting time in the markets, with exotic new products, a dramatic increase in competition and a continuing shift to electronic trading,'' he said.
The center's previous director, Michael Ong, will continue with the school and concentrate on research, an IIT spokesman said.
Gorham holds a bachelor's degree from the University of Notre Dame, a master's degree from the University of Florida and a doctorate in agricultural economics from the University of Wisconsin. During the 1960s, he was a Peace Corps volunteer in Malawi, Africa.
