About Us
The Dual Architect -
Forging Insight from Logic and Trauma
Identity & Role
- Dr. Rowan Mitchell Kearns (Age 63, U.S. National).
- Current Position: Chief Analyst at ZANJS Securities Ltd. (Joined 2023).
- Recognized as “The Systemic Investor Who Returned from Failure” and a leading authority on Behavioral Strategy in Finance.
The Denver Origin:
- Rowan was raised in the old industrial community of East Denver, Colorado, an environment characterized by harsh winters and working-class resilience. This setting instilled a deep, grounded understanding of real-world economic pressures.
The Family Foundry (The Dual Foundation):
- His intellectual foundation is a deliberate fusion of two disparate, highly specialized fields, creating his “dual personality blueprint.”
- Father (Aerospace Engineer): Contributed engineering-grade precision, structural mechanics, and rigid systemic logic. This trained Rowan to view markets as complex but solvable systems.
- Mother (Trauma Therapist): Contributed acute, trauma-informed intuition and a deep understanding of human stress response. This trained him to identify the emotional and psychological drivers behind market volatility.
- This combination is the source of his unique gift: the ability to simultaneously build complex quantitative models and predict the systemic failure points induced by collective human behavior.
The Catalyst of Risk Reverence (The 10-Year Lesson):
- The pivotal event that cemented his respect for market risk occurred at age 10 when his father’s aerospace company faced severe budget cuts and mass layoffs.
- The subsequent months of economic anxiety in his family—particularly watching his mother return from night shifts as a part-time therapist—instilled in him a profound understanding of economic fluctuation’s devastating real-world impact.
- Signature Quote (Personal): “My reverence for market risk was cultivated at 10, watching my mother return from the hospital at 3 AM.”
Academic Excellence: The Highest Rigor
- A Complete Financial Education: Dr. Kearns pursued the most rigorous academic path possible, culminating in the highest degree in his field.
- Brown University (BA Economics):
- Laying the theoretical foundation of classical and neoclassical economics.
- Authored early student research papers focusing on the “Non-Rational Behavior of Market Participants.”
- Served as President of the Student Investment Club.
- MIT Sloan (MS Financial Engineering):
- Focus Areas: Mastered quantitative models, stochastic calculus, and multi-factor risk system design.
- Applied Research: Participated in the highly selective MIT-Liberty Fund Joint Market Modeling Project, honing his skills in building and back-testing complex financial instruments.
- University of Chicago Booth School of Business (PhD in Finance):
- The Apex Degree: Attained a PhD from one of the world’s most prestigious schools for finance and economics, working under a recognized authority in Behavioral Finance.
- Doctoral Thesis Title: Risk Preference and Market Behavior: Asset Allocation Models under Systemic Stress.
- This thesis directly foreshadowed his later work, explicitly linking investor psychological states (stress, preference) to portfolio stability.
- Industry Collaboration: Engaged in multiple data experiments with the Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE) during his doctoral candidacy.
The Setback & Rebuilding: The -60% Catastrophe
The Peak (Age 28):
Post-PhD, Dr. Kearns quickly ascended on Wall Street, becoming one of the youngest Strategy Analysts and, by age 28, managing a substantial proprietary investment portfolio exceeding $100 Million.
The Failure:
- The Cause: His rapid success led to overconfidence and an unchecked structural flaw: his models were too heavily dependent on the continuation of a “singular macro environment.”
- The Event: A sudden, unpredictable “Black Swan” geopolitical or economic event caused his portfolio to suffer a devastating, short-term loss of -60%.
- This loss almost destroyed his early career and forced an immediate, painful reassessment of his methodology.
The Five-Year Hiatus (The Great Silence):
- Rowan voluntarily resigned and stepped away from the market for five years, returning to his quiet roots in Denver. He referred to this period as “The most painful yet most important asset of my life.”
- The Research Pillars of Reflection:
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT): Studying how internal thoughts and perceptions dictate action and creating protocols to interrupt self-sabotaging trading cycles.
- Advanced Meditation Practices: Developing methods for achieving genuine “cognitive quietude” to discern market signals from emotional noise.
- Human Risk Preference Modeling: Deeply studying behavioral economics and decision theory to understand systemic investor panic and herd mentality.
Core Framework: The "Mental Investment System"
- The Synthesis: The five years of reflection resulted in the creation of the "Mental Investment System", a rigorous methodology that applies psychological discipline to algorithmic rigor.
- Core Principle Documentation: The entire framework is detailed in his core internal paper: Mental Stability and Noise Filtering in Investment Decisions.
- Four Pillars of Discipline: His subsequent success is built upon four non-negotiable principles established during this time (e.g., "Risk Always Precedes Reward," "Never Trade from a Place of Cognitive Arousal," etc.).
- The Return (Age 40):
- Upon returning to the market at age 40, his new approach proved virtually impervious to behavioral traps.
- Proof: This system is the direct cause of his subsequent 12 consecutive years of positive annual returns, confirming that stability is indeed the ultimate competitive edge.