Alternative Finance for Small and Medium Shipowners

Prior to joining Hayfin, Mr. Majeski was at Breakwater Capital who were in an exclusive partnership with Hayfin since 2014. At Breakwater Capital Mr. Majeski focused exclusively on growing and managing their maritime lending platform. Prior to joining Breakwater, Mr. Majeski was a Senior Vice President at BTMU Capital Corporation (2001–2013) covering the transportation industry. Previously Mr. Majeski was a Bank Regulator for the U.S Federal Reserve.
Mr. Majeski holds an M.B.A. from Babson College (with honors) and a BS from Bryant University.

George is a Managing Director, heading the Real Assets platform of StormHarbour Securities out of London, which focuses on the firm’s Shipping and Real Estate practice.

He joined StormHarbour in October 2012 from Citigroup where he was heading Fixed Income and Equity Derivative Sales for Greece and Cyprus and co-heading Solution Sales for Central Eastern Europe, with focus on Real Estate and Transportation.

Prior to that, George was employed at Nomura International coming from Lehman Brothers. He has a long experience in structuring and executing Private Equity type transactions in shipping, with a variety of both listed and private European and Middle Eastern entities.
He has also successfully placed a series of debt instruments in the private and public markets, issued by shipping companies in the spaces of Tanker, LNG, Dry Bulk and Containers. George holds an MBA degree specializing in Corporate Finance from SDA Bocconi Business School.

Tobias joined Fleetscape in 2017. Prior to starting at Fleetscape, Mr. Backer was a Managing Director and Head of Shipping & Offshore at ICON Investments, an alternative investment manager in New York City, where he spent seven years. Prior thereto, he spent thirteen years as a ship finance banker at BNP Paribas, Fortis Bank and DNB Bank in New York City and in Oslo. Mr. Backer got his degrees in business administration and in International Relations from Boston University in the United States. Mr. Backer is a dual US and Norwegian citizen.

Mr. Magelssen is Fund Manager and Partner of NRP Maritime Asset Management. He has more than 16 years of experience from the maritime sector both within finance and engineering. Magelssen joined NRPMAM in 2019 following 12 years in Pareto Securities & Pareto Project Finance where he was a Senior Partner. He started his career in DNV GL in 2003 and holds an MSc in Mechanical Engineering.

Mr. George D. Gourdomichalis was born in 1967 in London.
He attended Athens College and went on to graduate from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst with a BA in International Economics and a BA in Political Science.
He further earned an MSc in Ocean Marine Transportation Management from the Maritime Academy of the State of New York.
In 1989 he joined Republic National Bank of New York as a management trainee and worked on their trading floor. In 1992 he joined S.S. Maritime Inc. of New York, where he worked as a chartering and S&P broker and was responsible for commercial management of Baltmed Shipping Co.
In 1996 he returned to Greece and co-founded Gourdomichalis Naftiki Eteria S.A. In 2000 he co-founded Free Ships S.A. and in 2003 he co-founded Free Bulkers S.A. These activities were consolidated and in 2005 were successfully merged resulting in the public listing of FreeSeas Inc. on the NASDAQ Exchange. This shareholding was sold in January 2007 where upon he co-founded G. Bros Maritime S.A., he is currently CEO of Blue Wall Shipping and Phoenix Shipping & Trading S.A. George serves on the RINA Hellenic Committee, the Board of Directors of the American P&I Club and the Industry Advisory Board of the North American Merchant Ministries Association, he is President of the Board of Directors of the Piraeus Marine Club, member of the British Hellenic Chamber of Commerce responsible for the shipping industry, member of the Board of Directors of the Hellenic Chamber of Shipping and member of the Baltic Exchange.

Stefanos Fragos is the Senior Representative of Yieldstreets Athens branch, which is dedicated to ship financing. 
Yieldstreet is changing the way wealth is created, providing access to asset- secured investments historically unavailable to most investors.
Alongside direct origination capabilities of the Athens branch, we also partner with experienced asset managers to originate, underwrite, and service investments across multiple asset classes.
Since 2015, we have closed over $1.5 billion across 170+ deals in 5 key verticals: Real Estate, Art, Legal, Marine, and Private Business Credit.  
Stefanos remains dedicated in servicing the marine finance industry for more than 18 years.  In his prior capacity at a major ship financing bank he was responsible for $800m in ship lending, majority of which were originated and structured by him.
He graduated from Newcastle University, UK, with bachelors and masters degrees in marine engineering, followed by a masters degree in Shipping Trade & Finance at City University of London.

Michiel is Managing Partner and Director of Zuyderzee Capital, a financial advisory boutique focused on maritime and logistics.
Before joining Zuyderzee mid 2019 Michiel was Michiel was Head of Shipping Finance Europe with DVB bank. Prior to this, Michiel has had other senior commercial, business development and risk management roles with DVB for a risk management perspective, managing numerous container equipment, shipping and infrastructure transactions. In addition Michiel was global head of Syndications for transportation debt for DVB Bank from 2005 to 2010.
Michiel holds a Masters degree (Erasmus University in Rotterdam) and completed a Risk Management program (INSEAD).