Mr. Simmons joined AREA in 2003 and oversees AREA's Domestic Emerging Markets business in North America. Jim has served as the CIO and then as the interim CEO of the Upper Manhattan Empowerment Zone Development Corporation. Prior to his appointment, he spent over 3 years as a fixed income trader. He was a member of the Emerging Markets Debt and Derivatives trading desk at Salomon Smith Barney, where he specialized in structuring Latin American, Eastern European and Asian sovereign and corporate debt. Mr. Simmons graduated with a BS in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from Princeton University, an MS in Engineering from the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University and a Masters in Business Administration from the J.L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University.