Investment Professional and Attorney Lives by Values Learned at St. John’s
While touring the campus as a high school student, Elin Minasi O’Brien ’10TCB, ’14L realized something unique about St. John’s University and the city it calls home.
Born in Germany to parents who fled religious persecution in Iran, she found the Queens, NY, campus a place of intellectual energy, spiritual support, and personal tranquility.
The St. John’s community is so tight and cares about outcomes for everyone.
Years later, the proud double alumna credits the values she learned from St. John’s close-knit, faith-driven community with helping her thrive in New York City’s rugged financial services sector.
“New York City is huge, and there are so many great opportunities,” Ms. Minasi O’Brien said. “The St. John’s community is so tight and cares about outcomes for everyone. Introductions, mentoring, these are little pieces—but when you aggregate all the small pieces, it goes a long way for people.”
Today, Ms. Minasi O’Brien is Executive Director, Senior Structuring Officer, for the Unified Global Alternatives business of UBS, the multinational investment bank and financial services firm. She commutes to the firm’s Manhattan, NY, offices from Woodbury, NY, where she lives with her husband and three children.
As part of UBS’s investment team, she is responsible for the structuring, due diligence, and deal negotiations of hedge fund portfolios and investments. She also leads volunteer efforts within her business unit, including hands-on service projects and fund-raising initiatives that draw upon the Vincentian values she embraced at St. John’s.
“I was the recipient of a great education, both in undergrad and law school,” Ms. Minasi O’Brien said. “Service to the communitywas just embedded in the curriculum. This translates to several service-learning opportunities we now do as a work team and family.”
Ms. Minasi O’Brien is a first-generation Armenian American whose family settled in Medford, NY. Her parents’ journey to the United States as religious refugees gave her a sense of purpose and gratitude.
Her interest in investment management was cultivated at The Peter J. Tobin College of Business, where she majored in finance, and at St. John’s School of Law, which she attended part time from 2010 to 2014. She earned her law degree while working full time in the University’s Office of Advancement and Office of the President.
While an undergraduate, she was a member of the President’s Society and the Student-Managed Investment Fund. She saw the compassionate side of the University when an illness required her to take a year-long medical leave.
Expecting bureaucracy, Ms. Minasi O’Brien discovered a University administration invested in her recovery and academic success. “Everyone said, ‘Let us coordinate and make sure we can take care of you and help you get back to proper health,’” she recalled. “St. John’s genuinely cared and that allowed me to focus on my health and recovery.”
She was later accepted into the School of Law, where she served as Vice President of the Evening Students Association and a Women’s Law Society member.
Ms. Minasi O’Brien has worked at several hedge fund businesses, including The Blackstone Group and HedgeMark. She was hired at UBS in January 2020 and has been promoted three times. In all of her positions, including at St. John’s, she has benefited from the wisdom and network of a good mentor.
Now an esteemed professional, she is committed to being the best mentor to the next generation of St. John’s graduates and financial industry professionals.
“Having an excellent mentor makes a world of difference, and a little can go a long way,” she said. “So, take a meeting with a student, make an introduction. Those moments are what shape someone’s trajectory.”
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