Alpha Exchange

Market risks come in all shapes and sizes. A good starting point might be to categorize them as economic, financial, or monetary. But increasingly, and unfortunately, geopolitical risk is a threat that must be closely monitored and understood. And in this context, it was a pleasure to welcome Robert Dannenberg to the Alpha Exchange. Spending his entire career as an operations officer in the CIA, Rob served in various leadership positions, including as both chief of operations for the Counterterrorism Center and chief of the Central Eurasia Division.With two tours of duty in Moscow, he faced off against Russian counterparts and in Rob’s words, his role was to ”steal their secrets and break their stuff”. Our conversation is primarily focused on the Russia/Ukraine conflict and in gaining a better appreciation for what drives Vladimir Putin. Here, Rob asserts that while perhaps deeply flawed, Putin has a highly convicted interpretation of history, citing a speech back in 2007 in Munich where he laid out a list of