Our Team

Bob Sewell, CFA, CMA, CFP

President and CEO

Bob has over 20 years of experience in the discretionary investment management and brokerage business and has established a reputation as a turnaround specialist and business builder. Prior to founding Bellwether, he led TD Waterhouse Private Investment Counsel, the TD Bank’s discretionary investment management division. Under Bob’s leadership Private Investment Counsel grew from $8 billion to $15 billion in assets under management.

Bob has been responsible for managing and building a wide range of Wealth Management businesses including: establishing the Royal Bank’s financial planning group; a private fund family; creating an offshore investment program; a Barbados chartered Bank that provided family office services; and a client base with responsibility for global equities and fixed income management. In each case, Bob has focused on serving the needs of High Net Worth clients in Canada and internationally.

Bob completed his Bachelor of Science degree at the University of Toronto. He is a CFA charter holder which is awarded by the CFA Institute in Charlottesville, Virginia, USA. The CFA Institute is the global association of investment professionals that promotes the highest ethical standards and on-going education for investment managers. Bob is also a Certified Management Accountant (CMA), Certified Financial Planner (CFP) and Certified Investment Manager (CIM). Bob is registered as a Portfolio Manager and Chief Compliance Officer with the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC). Bob resides in Mississauga with his two daughters.

Click here to get to know Bob

John Wood

Chairman

John has 30 years of experience in the financial industry and has garnered a reputation as an innovator and business builder in the Canadian investment community. He participated in the founding of 20/20 Financial Inc., and as CEO, led its rapid growth from zero assets to over $4 billion under management. He replicated this success in building Financial Concept Group and Maxxum Fund Management Ltd.

John is a Director of several private companies and is passionate about giving back to the community. He serves as Chairman of the Canadian Olympic Committee's (COC) Investment Committee, and is also Chairman of the Joseph H. M. Wood Foundation.

In 1976 John Wood won an Olympic Silver Medal for Canada in Canoeing at the 1976 Montreal Olympics. The same year he was presented with the Governor Generals Medal for his achievements. He went on to win a bronze medal in sailing at the 1979 Pan Am Games.

John is a graduate of McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada. He completed Level 1 of the Chartered Financial Analyst program, is a Fellow of The Canadian Securities Institute and is licensed for Investment Counsel & Portfolio Management. John resides in Oakville with his wife Deborah and has four children. He remains active in the world of athletics and serves in numerous community fundraisers.

Click here to get to know John

Art Heginbottom

Vice President and Portfolio Manager

Art brings over 45 years of experience in investment management to Bellwether, with the majority of his career being devoted to Estate and Trust and High Net Worth clients. Prior to joining Bellwether in January 2010, Art was most recently a Managing Director of TD Asset Management as well as Chief Investment Officer (CIO) for TD Canada Trust’s Private Trust division.

Art started his career with a “sell side” investment dealer but after a short time, he moved to the “buy side” when he joined Guaranty Trust which later became Central Guaranty Trust (CGT) in 1987. During his time with CGT, Art held a number of progressively more senior positions including Assistant Treasurer; Chief Investment Officer; Senior Manager, Equity Investments; and Vice President, Equity Investments. In 1993, TD Bank acquired the assets of CGT and Art has spent the balance of his career with the TD Bank.

During the 1980s, Art’s responsibilities with the trust company included assisting in the management of the corporate balance sheet, retail mutual fund management, managing corporate pension fund accounts as well as managing High Net Worth estate, trust and agency accounts. Art developed and managed a family of common trust funds used exclusively by the trust company’s estate & trust clients that at their peak exceeded $1 billion.

Since joining TD Bank in 1993, Art’s investment management responsibilities expanded to also include developing and being the lead manager for three distinct equity investment models known as Blue Chip, Dividend and US Large Cap. Under Art’s management the assets under management (AUM) for the three models grew to over $2.8 billion. All three models experienced positive returns and regularly exceeded their respective benchmarks. The models and their strategies continue to be widely used by TD Waterhouse Private Investment Counsel Inc. Art’s CIO responsibilities with the trust company included establishing and maintaining investment guidelines/asset mixes for Private Trust clients plus having direct responsibility for the management of all North American equity common trust funds. While there can be no guarantees in terms of future performance, during the period 1982 from its inception until 2008 the Canadian CTF equity fund managed by Art did generate “annual” compounded returns in excess of 15%.

Art graduated in Business Administration degree from Ryerson Polytechnic University and has completed several industry-related courses including the Canadian Investment Manager (CIM) designation and Manager, Trust Investments (MTI) from the Canadian Securities Institute and Trust Companies Association. Art is married to Daphne and has 5 adult children and 5 grandchildren. His recreational interests include cycling, downhill skiing, golf, wine collecting and travel.

Bill Sharp

VP and Portfolio Manager

Bill brings with him over 45 years of experience in financial services, the first half of which was devoted to the institutional business and the second focused on private clients. Prior to joining BELLWETHER in November 2008, Bill was associated with Valern Investment Management Inc. in Oakville, Ontario, where he specialized in private client discretionary portfolio management.

Bill started his career at United Corporations, a closed-end publicly traded investment company. There he was involved in creating the Royfund with Royal Bank of Canada; this was one of the original Canadian bank owned mutual funds. After 14 years with United, he moved to Morgan Trust to initiate their investment department.

In 1981 Bill joined National Trust to manage pension funds in Eastern Canada. He moved from Montreal to Toronto with National where he was invited to join the central management group. After nearly 30 years on the institutional side of the business, he decided to focus his financial acumen on personal money management for high net-worth investors. Bill is well known by his clients for his experience and effective communications. He prides himself on getting to know each of his clients personally, and garnering their trust to allow him to manage their overall Worth appreciation.

Bill holds a Commerce degree from Concordia University, and he did post graduate studies in Business Administration at McGill University, in Montreal. He joined the Board of Directors of the International Federation of Technical Analysts in 1992 and became Treasurer of the Federation in 1998. In 2004 he was elected to a 3-year term as Chairman of the Board of Directors, and subsequently served as a Director. The Federation represents over 7,000 analysts in 26 countries worldwide.

He has been wed to Gail for 43 years, and they have 3 married children and several grandchildren. His recreational interests are downhill skiing, badminton, paddling in Hawaiian outrigger canoes and wilderness tripping. As a member of the Golden Masters division of Team Canada, he along with 11 team members won a Bronze medal at the 2008 World Outrigger Canoe Sprint Championships in Sacramento, California.

Franca Williams

Financial Consultant

Franca has 35 years experience in Financial Services, having worked for the TD Bank Financial Group for her entire career. She has held a number of positions, initially focused on managing the operations of the Bank’s retail branches in various affluent residential and business communities and later provided tailored investment solutions to High Net Worth clients.

After building an extensive knowledge of Financial Services within the retail division, Franca joined TD Waterhouse Private Client Services in 1997 where she remained until leaving TD in late 2009. Franca’s broad financial knowledge was a critical aspect of her success in her role as Account Executive/Financial Consultant serving the Bank’s High Net Worth clients. In this capacity, she consulted with affluent clients on their objectives and worked with other team members to provide tailored solutions to meet their financial objectives.

Franca’s extensive experience and proven ability to build and maintain professional relationships with clients based on trust and high ethical standards has made her a valuable member of the Bellwether team.

Christine Knupp

Portfolio Administration and Client Service Manager

Chris has over 25 years experience in Financial Services, primarily in administration and client services within the Investment Management industry. She has worked with a broad range of clients including Institutional, Private, Foundations and Retail.

Her career spans across several recognized investment firms, such as; Richardson Greenshields, C.A. Delaney Capital Management, and Dundee Securities Corporation. During her 15 years at Richardson Greenshields, Chris was Office Manager, Institutional Equity Sales and Trading and ran the day to day administration. Her main roles were client service, creating and maintaining the client database, timely distribution of research material, and trade settlement and clearing. In 1992 Chris joined Kiki Delaney as she formed her new company, C.A. Delaney Capital Management Ltd which specializes in private clients and foundations. Her main role again, was client service and portfolio administration. Chris was responsible for client reporting, communication and maintaining the client database as well as portfolio administration, tax reporting and compliance.

Chris continues to use her client and administrative knowledge and experience at Bellwether. Her main roles are client service, communication and reporting. She also manages portfolio administration for the company.

Throughout her career, she has always maintained a "can do" attitude with regards to her work and especially client communication. Her vast experience and primary focus on client service has made her a valuable member of Bellwether's team.

Chris is a Business Administration graduate of Ryerson University, Toronto, Canada with a major in computer business information systems. She has completed the Canadian Securities Course. Chris has lived in various places within the United States and Canada, and currently lives in Oakville with her partner Dave, son Kyle and step-daughter Sarah. She enjoys entertaining family and friends and "Cottage Life" in her spare time.