Peter Mantas and Matthew Castel: Today’s Notable Young Professionals

Today’s Notable Young Professionals are Peter Mantas and Matthew Castel, fund managers by title but financial problem solvers by vocation. Here’s what inspired them to pursue a career in finance and where they see themselves in five years…

Elevator Pitch: Describe your job in a nutshell.
We are fund managers by title but financial problem solvers by vocation. We search for investment opportunities in the financial markets and seek to empower individuals to take control of their financial futures.

Why did you start working at your company? What was the inspiration for this career route?
Coming from families that encouraged self-reliance and ambition we both grew up with a passion for business. We started investing in the stock market together during law school and our interdisciplinary strategy performed well, offering us financial freedom and a reputation for sound investing. We started getting many requests for investment advice and began noticing a serious deficiency in financial literacy among our younger generation. We decided to tackle this problem by starting a business focused on financial empowerment.

What is the best part of what you do on a day-to-day basis? The most challenging part?
The best part of what we do is the feeling of satisfaction when someone tells us that our investment ideas/decisions have made a positive financial impact on their life. On a more day-to-day basis the best part of what we do is searching for valuable investment opportunities. Learning about new businesses and financial trends that have the potential for positive financial returns makes every day full of excitement and variety. Nevertheless, capital allocation is very detail-oriented so the most challenging aspect is ensuring that we have covered everything in our analysis while maintaining the discipline required to make the right deal at the right time.

What is one sign that you’ve seen over the years to suggest that your work/life balance is off?
Our work/life balance may be off when we feel unhappy. We believe that happiness and good health in our personal lives are linked to sound decision-making, so we put a lot of emphasis on understanding life as “being” rather than just “doing”.

Where do you see yourself in 5 years?
Over the next while we will be working on creating a community focused on financial democratization and empowerment, where like-minded individuals will be able to learn, connect and collaborate in order to take control of their financial futures. We plan to offer a newsletter journal in addition to an en-suite of financial information products that we hope will appeal to a dynamic, well-rounded group of individuals. These community tools will be easy to use and won’t entail exorbitant fees, which enrich traditional investment entities rather than the individual investor.

What is one major challenge that you’ve had to overcome in your career? How did you overcome it?
The greatest challenge we have had in our careers was leaving the practice of law and starting our investment partnership. It required a large amount of trust, hard work, discipline and strong early returns – all this at a time when the market was recovering from a recession, large hedge funds were collapsing, trust in the financial community was faltering, competition was getting more intense and global markets were shaky. We overcame this challenge by maintaining a long-term perspective, setting manageable key goals and executing one at a time.

What does success look like to you? Does Money = Happiness?
For us success isn’t about getting “rich” or accumulating money. Instead, it’s about living life to our full potential. It’s about increasing our capabilities. Do you have the capability to live a long and happy life? The capability to take advantage of an interesting opportunity? Thus, money is about freedom. The freedom to go travel to the Grand Prix in Monaco or the freedom to set up a foundation to improve education for youth in Sierra Leone.

What is the most memorable milestone in your career?
Our most memorable moment was when we received our first significant cheque from an investor in our partnership. The partnership is very closely-held and that exchange represented a physical symbol of trust, which is something we try to uphold everyday.

Do you have any advice for other young professionals?

We have a few pieces of advice for young professionals:

1. Make your life about continuous learning: read more, try to learn new things, test your ideas and beliefs and surround yourself with people who know things you don’t.

2. Set goals for yourself and write them down so you can continuously make reference to them.

3. Think about happiness as a skill and reflect upon the difference between making a living and making a life.

4. Trust yourself. As Warren Buffet would say: pay more attention to your inner scorecard (what you believe and how you define success) rather than your outer scorecard (what everyone else is saying about your ideas and dreams).

Where is your favourite place to wine/dine in your city and why?
Both of us have Mediterranean backgrounds so we love the new Greek place in Toronto on Ossington called Mamakas. We also enjoy the cozy little spot called Peoples Eatery on Spadina. 

When you’re not working how do you love to spend your “Me” time?
We both read a lot so our work time often blends right into our “Me” time, but to stay balanced we play pick up basketball, hockey and we work out. We’ve been getting into meditation and both love music (DJing and producing).

Where is your favorite place to travel? Why?
Definitely the South of France. The Riviera has something for everybody.

If you had to choose a theme song, what would it be?

Peter: Jay-Z – The Ruler’s Back
Matthew: Classixx – Borderline

If you weren’t doing what you’re doing, what would you be doing?
We would probably both be professors or musicians.

Do you support any charities? If so, which one(s) and why is that important to you?
We both believe strongly in youth education and empowerment so we support the Toronto-based Salama Shield Foundation, which focuses on capacity building in East Africa. We also support the Young Street Mission and Big Brothers Big Sisters of Canada.

What to you is notable?
Discipline, empathy, humility and those who aren’t afraid to fail.

Blackberry, iPhone, Android, or Other? 

Peter: Blackberry
Matthew: iPhone

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