Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

Robert Aguilar echoes one of the truest maxims for underrepresented communities seeking out mentorship, inspiration, and possibility: “If you can see it, you can be it.” The president of Cabrera Capital Markets, one of the nation’s leading minority-owned investment banks, describes himself as a kid from the West Side of Chicago. Even as he keeps that identity close to him, he’s become much more to so many in the finance space.

Aguilar speaks frankly about Latinos’ underrepresentation in finance. Despite accounting for nearly 20 percent of the US population, and contributing some $4.1 trillion to the US GDP, their presence in finance remains a relative rarity.

“If the US Latino population were a country in and of itself, it would be the fifth largest country in the world,” Aguilar explains. “It’s unfortunate where we find ourselves, although it has gotten better from when Martin and I started out.”

The president is speaking of founder and CEO Martin Cabrera Jr., a man Aguilar has known since his undergrad years at Northern Illinois University. When Cabrera entered equity trading after college, Aguilar initially pursued operations and management roles in the logistics sector. After the founding of Cabrera Capital in 2001, the company’s namesake convinced his old friend to join on as chief operating officer in 2003, leveraging his operations expertise to help the young firm find its footing.

For nearly two decades, Aguilar acted as the internal engine of Cabrera Capital Markets, while Cabrera himself focused on external growth and business development. Aguilar took on his current mantle in 2022, recognizing a new period of focus and growth for the firm. That focus is financial, but there is also a mission buried deep in the DNA of the organization.

For students at Chicago’s Lee Elementary, Cabrera is a name the students already know well. In 2023, the firm and Chicago Public Schools announced a new partnership aimed at strengthening the financial literacy and planning skills of Lee students and their families.

The partnership includes a full-time community engagement and financial education coordinator at Lee Elementary, supplementary funding for 529 college savings accounts the firm opened for students, and allocated funds to create brokerage accounts for each grade level at Lee Elementary, with a starting investment of $20,000 per grade. A share of gains accrued will be distributed to students’ individual accounts upon graduation from eighth grade, with the original investment being reinvested into classes at Lee.

“We also are a big supporter of The Stock Market Game,” Aguilar explains of the online simulation that students from grades 4–12 are allowed to participate in. “Research has shown that participation in the game boosts both reading and math scores on standardized tests. We’re just trying to find ways to give students a leg up on futures they may not have imagined they could have. This is how you start.”

Aguilar says his firm takes representation seriously because both the founder and the president understand what it can mean for someone just beginning their career to see two Latinos at the top of a firm like Cabrera.

The company offers internships and has sourced more diverse pipelines to source talent from underserved communities that might otherwise be overlooked. Traditional financial hiring practices aren’t necessarily intentionally blocking out those applicants (at least in theory), but the structures in place for traditional financial hiring pipelines were created with affluent people in mind. If you want more Aguilars and Cabreras, you need to create systems that nurture them. Aguilar understands this implicitly.

Of course, the ability for the firm to create change relies on the strength of its position. There, too, Aguilar is helping drive continued growth. The company is expanding its advisory services, particularly in mergers and acquisitions work for smaller companies and private equity transactions. The president sees significant opportunity in private markets, where diverse firms like Cabrera have historically been underrepresented.

Additionally, Cabrera is looking to expand its international footprint. It’s already trading around the clock, given the opening and closing of global markets, and recently deepened its presence in Latin America by expanding equities trading operations across Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Peru. Cabrera is looking to establish a physical presence in Europe and, eventually, Asia.

“We’re just trying to find ways to give students a leg up on futures they may not have imagined they could have.”

Robert Aguilar

Aguilar somehow finds additional time to be the person for others to see. He serves on the influential boards of directors for Chicago Public Media, and the Illinois Latino Caucus Foundation, and is also a member of the Chicago Blackhawks Society He’s previously served on the Chicago United, La Rabida Children’s Hospital, and Chicago Park District Foundation boards. Most recently, the president had spoken to students from the Midtown Metro Foundation about careers in finance, reminding them that anything is possible.

“Building a diverse workforce just makes sense,” Aguilar says. “At our firm, we wouldn’t build any portfolio that wasn’t diversified. We’re not talking rocket science here. I hope we’re doing our part to make our community a better place to live. It’s what we believe we should be doing.”