Nicholas A. Giordano has stepped down from the post of chairman of the board of the Wilmington Trust in favor of fellow independent trustee Donald E. Foley, who took over as chair in January of this year.
Giordano, 80, joined the board in 2012 and has served as chairman since January 2015 – a position to which he was elected after stepping down from the chairmanship of the board’s Audit Committee. After his resignation, he returned to his previous position as one of four independent trustees who make up the board overseeing the 10 funds in the Wilmington Trust.
Giordano was president and CEO of the Philadelphia Stock Exchange between 1981 and 1997, and interim president at LaSalle University between July 1998 and June of 1999 who also holds a seat on the board of RBB Fund, Inc.; he previously served on the boards of Kalmar Pooled Investment Trust and biomedical device firm IntriCon Corp.
Foley, 71, was chairman and CEO of Wilmington Trust when the trust merged with M&T Bank Corp. in 2010. He has been an independent trustee of Wilmington Trust funds since December of 2015. He took over as chairman after Giordano stepped down at the end of 2022, according to an SEC filing dated Feb. 1.
Foley took over as head of Wilmington Trust Corp. during a difficult period following the financial crisis of 2008/2009, according to a 2010 Bloomberg News story. He also worked as SVP and assistant treasurer at ITT Corp. and held global capital markets, treasury, and tax-related positions at International Paper Co., Exxon Mobil Corp. and General Electric Co.
The other two independent trustees are Gregory P. Chandler, 56, and Valerie J. Sill, 60.
All four are members of the board’s Audit Committee. The board also maintains a Nominating and Governance Committee chaired by Sill, and sends a representative to a Pricing Committee made up of one independent trustee and representatives from the advisor.
The board’s one interested trustee is Eric W. Taylor, 41, who has been EVP and head of investment implementation since 2018 at Wilmington Trust, N.A. a subsidiary of M&T Bank Corp., which is the parent company of Wilmington Trust and serves as adviser to the funds.
Independent trustees are elected to indefinite terms on the board, which currently oversees 10 funds with approximately 11.8bln under management. Total compensation for independent trustees ranged between $115,250 and $140,250 during the fiscal year ended April 30, 2022.
Kaushik Goswami, 49, has been chief compliance officer and anti-money laundering officer of the funds since 2021.
