John A.  Courson
President and Chief Executive Officer
Mortgage Bankers Association
Session: Opening General Session

John A. Courson is President and Chief Executive Officer of the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA). Courson has been involved in the mortgage industry for more than 40 years and served as Chairman of MBA in 2003.

Courson began his lifelong career in mortgage banking working for Kassler & Co. where he worked as a loan officer on both commercial and residential loans and eventually became the company's President and Chief Executive Officer. From 2004 to 2008, Courson served as Chairman of the Board of Directors of the California Housing Finance Agency, a position to which he was appointed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. 

Robert E. Story, CMB
President
Seattle Financial Group
Session: Opening General Session

Robert E. Story, Jr., CMB, Chairman of the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA), is President and Chief Executive Officer of Seattle Financial Group, parent company to Seattle Mortgage, Seattle Bank, Seattle Insurance Group, Seattle Capital and Seattle Escrow. He oversees the management of these business units to ensure strategic alignment with the company's overall goals. Story has managed all aspects of residential loan production, construction lending and commercial loan brokerage and was instrumental in Seattle Financial Group's diversification over the last decade, which included the formation of a savings bank and a capital investment company and acquisition of an insurance brokerage.

David A. Roberts, CMB
President and Chief Operating Officer
Grandbridge Real Estate Capital LLC
Session: Opening General Session

David A. Roberts is President and Chief Operating Officer of Grandbridge Real Estate Capital LLC, one of the country's leading full-service commercial mortgage banking firms with 27 production offices and a servicing portfolio of $21 billion. He is President of Grandbridge's proprietary lending subsidiary, Grandbridge Funding LLC, which originates interim commercial real estate loans for its own portfolio and is on the Grandbridge Board of Managers and its Executive Committee.

Roberts is active in the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA), serving as Chair on the MBA's Commercial Real Estate / Multifamily Finance Board of Governors (COMBOG). He currently serves on the MBA's Board of Directors, on Fannie Mae's DUS® Advisory Council, is a member of  the National Multi-Housing Council and numerous other professional organizations.

William J.  Hornbuckle
Chief Marketing Officer
MGM Mirage
Session: Opening General Session

William J. Hornbuckle is the Chief Marketing Officer of MGM MIRAGE. He oversees the MGM Grand Macau property, as well as all marketing functions throughout the company. His responsibilities focus entirely on positioning the MGM MIRAGE portfolio of properties, driving profitability and leveraging the company's assets.  He also serves as President and Chief Operating Officer for MAC Corp., an MGM MIRAGE Atlantic City Development subsidiary.

Hornbuckle serves on the Board of Directors of the Andre Agassi Foundation and is a member of the Board of Trustees for Three Square. Previously, he served on the boards for the United Way of Southern Nevada and the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority.

William D. Cohan
Author and
Former Wall Street Banker
Session: Opening General Session

Former Wall Street senior banker and best-selling investigative journalist, William D. Cohan offers audiences a unique, close-up perspective of the greatest financial crisis since the Great Depression. He has written two books about Wall Street: House of Cards: A Tale of Hubris and Wretched Excess on Wall Street and The Last Tycoons: The Secret History of Lazard Frères & Co. (winner of the 2007 Financial Times/Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award). A Wall Street banker for 17 years, Cohan provides a long-time insider's in-depth knowledge of investment banking. In addition to his years as Associate, then Vice President at Lazard Frères, he was a Director in the Mergers & Acquisitions Group at Merrill Lynch and a Managing Director at JPMorgan Chase.

Jay Brinkmann, Ph.D.
Chief Economist and Senior Vice President, Research and Economics
Mortgage Bankers Association
Session: Third General Session: The Current State of the Industry

Jay Brinkmann, Ph.D. is Chief Economist and Senior Vice President of Research and Economics for the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA), where his responsibilities include economic forecasting, mortgage industry analysis, benchmarking of industry profitability and providing support for legislative and regulatory initiatives.

Immediately prior to MBA, Brinkmann worked in Fannie Mae's portfolio strategy group. He joined the Mortgage Bankers Association in early 2001 to build MBA's commercial real estate research efforts and was named Chief Economist in 2008.

Jamie Woodwell
Vice President, Commercial/Multifamily Research
Mortgage Bankers Association
Session: Third General Session: The Current State of the Industry

Jamie Woodwell is Vice President of Commercial Real Estate Research at the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA). As leader for the MBA's research on commercial and multifamily finance issues, Woodwell is responsible for providing economic and policy analysis in the area of real estate finance. Woodwell oversees MBA's surveys on commercial/multifamily production and servicing and produces regular and topical reports on the commercial/multifamily finance environment.  Previously, he was the manager of data initiatives for Fannie Mae's multifamily group.