Julia M. Whitehead (jwhitehead@whiteheadmiller.com) has been providing strategic, financial and operational advice to public and private entities in matters involving financial distress for more than twenty years. During her tenure at WMA, she has completed advisory and restructuring assignments on behalf of pension funds, private equity funds and corporate and non-profit clients in areas as diverse as valuation, investor communications, strategic redirection, bankruptcy reorganization, real estate financing and recovery strategies in “busted” investments.  She also has been retained as a consultant in numerous complex litigation matters involving financial markets, disclosure and accounting matters for clients who include some of the country’s largest financial institutions, investors and professional service firms.  Additionally, she has provided restructuring advice, including serving as restructuring advisor and crisis manager for the multi-billion dollar asset manager Forstmann-Leff and advised on its sale to a private equity firm which transaction was named “Deal of the Year by The Deal magazine and has also advised members of Congress on issues relating to the credit crisis and co-drafted the frameworks for two bills related to that crisis.

From 1993 to 2000, Ms. Whitehead was also a principal and co-founder of Chusid/Whitehead Associates, a firm focused on providing financial advice on the restructuring of troubled real estate assets and a recognized authority in the rehabilitation of distressed real estate co-ops. At Chusid-Whitehead, Ms. Whitehead, a co-holder of a patent on a mortgage product and process used in the restructuring of excessive mortgage debt, served as financial advisor and expert witness in numerous bankruptcy proceedings and other litigation matters including the asset recovery proceedings of National Heritage Life Insurance Company which, at the time, was the subject of one of the largest white collar frauds ever uncovered. Ms. Whitehead was also previously an executive at International Finance Group, Inc., a private merchant bank engaged in turnaround management where she directed restructuring operations for IFG portfolio companies and advisory clients. Ms. Whitehead was also formerly a Senior Vice President in Corporate Finance at Dean Witter Reynolds and a Corporate Development officer at the First Boston Corporation. Ms. Whitehead started her career at the General Electric Company where she was trained in that company's renowned Financial Management Program and held positions in finance and strategic planning including manager of international strategic planning for the $6 billion consumer products businesses.

Ms. Whitehead received her MBA in finance and public policy from the Johnson School of Management of Cornell University and her BA in economics and political science from Yale University.  She is a published author on numerous topics including credit default swaps, the implications of the 2006 Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act, the role of the rating agencies in the subprime crisis, for which she has also provided testimony to Congress,  and issues in the accounting treatment of Level II and Level III assets. She has been quoted on these and other issues in domestic and international publications including The Wall Street Journal, Forbes Magazine, the Los Angeles Times and the Financial Times.  She has also been a featured speaker on financial topics at law firm symposiums and national public pension fund association meetings, a frequent columnist for Dow Jones' Daily Bankruptcy Review and has given multi-week courses on co-ops and condos to institutions such as Swiss Bank (now UBS) and ING.