Kareem Hamza, CFA
CEO and Lead Portfolio Manager     

Kareem is responsible for Introspect Capital’s corporate strategy and developing the firm’s investment process.

Kareem has spent his life travelling and living in emerging, frontier and developed countries. In 2008, Kareem moved to Dubai from London where he has since lived and worked, starting as an investment analyst before progressing to portfolio manager and Introspect Capital founder.

Following a master’s in finance at CASS Business School and a master’s in politics from Bristol University, Kareem had aspirations of a career in academia. In 2010, a few weeks before starting a highly competitive doctoral program in finance at the University of Toronto, Kareem shifted his focus away from academia, in favor of remaining within the asset management industry.

Kareem brings over thirteen years of experience in managing MENA equity strategies to his role at Introspect. In 2009, he joined Arqaam Capital, a Dubai-based regional investment bank, as an equity analyst for one of the longest running MENA hedge funds, where he quickly rose through the ranks, progressing to portfolio manager before leaving in 2017 to launch Introspect. During this time, he met Marwan Hayek and Omar Shams who would eventually become Introspect’s founding team. They realized they had different and complementary skill sets and enjoyed working together, and saw an opportunity to build a lasting investment platform that aligned the interests of all stakeholders.

When he’s not recovering from his latest injury, Kareem is an avid ice hockey player and has been playing in the UAE Emirates Ice Hockey League since 2009. Kareem believes his hockey skills are progressively getting worse but maintains that he is still one of the best CFA charterholder hockey players in the Middle East, absent of any proof of course.