Expertise
Victor Guo is Managing Director, Head of M&A and Activism, Corporate Governance & ESG (Canada). Prior to Sodali & Co's acquisition of Gryphon Advisors, Victor was the President of Frontline Advisors Inc., the governance advisory arm of Gryphon. Victor is responsible for Canadian business where he leads a team of experienced governance professionals.
Victor has close to 20 years of capital market experience where he has established himself as an expert in corporate governance advisory work with an in depth focus on M&A, shareholder activism, compensation and ESG. Prior to Frontline, Victor was Executive Vice President, Governance Special Situations at Kingsdale Advisors where he was involved in more than 50 contested situations and devised sophisticated governance strategies for both corporate and activist clients. His select high-profile signature wins include FrontFour & Sandpiper in their action against Granite REIT and Crescent Point in their defense against Cation Capital. In addition to his sophisticated and profound expertise in M&A and activism, he regularly provides expert analysis and practical solutions to corporate clients on their corporate governance, compensation and ESG strategies.
Prior to Kingsdale, Victor was Head of M&A and Proxy Contest Research at Institutional Shareholder Services Inc.’s (“ISS”) Canada where he assembled and trained the M&A research team. He was also a vice president and core member of the ISS US Special Situations Research (“SSR”) team. At ISS, he covered and provided vote recommendations to institutional clients for over 80 North American proxy contests as well as more than 1000 M&A transactions. He also opined on a large number of high-profile Canadian contentious AGMs including say-on-pay votes during his tenure at ISS. In his early career, Victor conducted equity valuation and transfer pricing work at NERA Economic Consulting, a division of the Oliver Wyman Group.
Victor holds an MBA in Finance and Blue Ocean Strategy from INSEAD and a Bachelor of Commerce degree (Double Specialist in Commerce & Finance and Economics, Minor in Mathematics) from the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto. Victor is a CFA Charterholder and also holds the Certificate in ESG Investing credential from the CFA Institute.
