U.S. Senate Confirms Maryland Smith’s Michael Faulkender for Treasury Post

The U.S. Senate has voted to confirm Michael Faulkender, recently associate dean of master’s programs and professor of finance at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business, as assistant secretary for economic policy at the Treasury Department.

In this role, Faulkender will advise the Secretary of the Treasury and the Trump Administration on economic developments in the U.S. and world economies and assist in the determination of appropriate economic policies. His research with Maryland Smith has been published in leading academic journals on topics such as capital structure, corporate liquidity, risk management, and executive compensation. The work has been recognized with numerous awards and frequent citations in the financial press and led to Faulkender as a frequent expert source on finance topics in major business news publications.

As a teacher, Faulkender has received numerous awards from graduating MBA students for his engagement in the full-time MBA program and two years ago won the school’s Krowe Teaching Excellence Award. His service to the school has included director of the master of finance program, chair of the masters oversight committee and service on numerous task forces and committees, culminating in his appointment in January 2017 as associate dean of masters programs. In that role, he has overseen curricular updates to the full-time, part-time, and online MBA programs, as well as the launching of three new specialty masters programs.

“Mike is an outstanding scholar and leader.  Initiatives that he guided and led include the D.C. region’s first STEM-certified Master of Quantitative Finance program and a top-five-ranked (in the U.S.) Master of Finance program,” says Maryland Smith Senior Associate Dean for Faculty and Research Ritu Agarwal, who becomes the school’s interim dean, effective August 15. “He has been integral to laying the groundwork for Maryland Smith students to be competitive and excel in corporate finance, investment banking and financial planning, especially as these fields increasingly emphasize both quantitative and client-facing skills.” 

Between President Trump’s March 2018 nomination of Faulkender for the post and the Aug. 1, 2019 Senate confirmation, Faulkender served in his Maryland Smith associate dean’s role through December 2018, then joined the Treasury in February 2019 as Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary in the economic policy office. The office participates in the preparation of the administration’s budget and supports the secretary in his roles as Chairman and Managing Trustee of the Social Security and Medicare Boards of Trustees. 

“I am extremely grateful to Secretary Mnuchin and President Trump for the opportunity to serve our nation and the Department of the Treasury,” says Faulkender, who joined Maryland Smith in 2008 as an assistant professor of finance. “I want to express my gratitude to the United States Senate for their overwhelming, bipartisan support yesterday.  The American economy is thriving, and I look forward to serving an administration that is delivering the longest economic expansion in our nation’s history.”