Chip Beard joined Waverly Advisors in May of 2024 after the acquisition of Derbend Asset Management. He serves as Partner and Wealth Advisor for the firm. His financial knowledge and diverse experience have laid a strong foundation in his career. With his guidance, clients’ finances have remained steadfast through the ups and downs of the economy and the ever-shifting market.
Chip attended the University of Arkansas on a football scholarship and received his MBA in 1983. Starting out as a financial consultant, Chip began his career with Merrill Lynch in 1983 and managed a Merrill Lynch branch office through the October 1987 market tumult. In 1990, Chip left the brokerage industry for the venture capital world after buying a fledgling software company named Graphic Data Analysis in Athens, Georgia. After selling the company, Chip joined The Habersham Group, a private equity investment firm. He established offices for The Habersham Group in Brussels, Belgium, and Lausanne, Switzerland and was responsible for venture capital and private equity projects in Central and Eastern Europe.
After returning to the United States in 2000, Chip worked as a global strategist for Invesco, a large asset management firm in Atlanta. In 2002, he opened Derbend Asset Management in Peachtree City, a suburb of Atlanta. Chip’s decades of financial experience combined with his wide global perspective allow him to guide clients effectively to reach their goals.