Todd Fries

Mr. Fries writes on the valuation of insurance organizations for IRMI.com.

As a partner at the BVA Group (BVA), Mr. Fries is the coleader of the firm's valuation practice and is involved in overseeing all aspects of the firm's service lines, which, in addition to valuation services, also include financial advisory and dispute resolution services.

Mr. Fries has 20 years of valuation, litigation support, and financial advisory services experience. He has conducted hundreds of valuation analyses for fair value, tax, and other purposes for clients operating in property and casualty, life, and health insurance segments, as well as across a broad range of other industries, including health care, energy, manufacturing, distribution, and technology.

Mr. Fries is frequently involved in assignments performed for private equity or private equity–backed clients for a variety of purposes including mark-to-market accounting, purchase price allocations, goodwill impairment testing, and valuations relating to incentive stock compensation. He has deep experience with the valuation of derivative securities and entities with complex capital structures that include multiple tranches of equity or equity-like securities.

Mr. Fries also has deep experience in BVA's litigation support practice, where he is involved in the determination of lost profits, lost business value, unjust enrichment, and/or reasonable royalty calculations in matters involving commercial litigation including intellectual property infringement, breach of contract/duty, and valuation-related disputes. He has testified and/or presented in mediation proceedings on multiple occasions in matters involving business valuation, lost profits, and lost earnings.

Throughout his career, Mr. Fries has been involved in numerous financial advisory engagements such as fairness opinions and solvency opinions. He also frequently leads the team engaged to assist in situations where former business partners are looking to unwind their existing relationship through a buyout of one or more of the partners. Mr. Fries’s experience in this area ranges from friendly buyouts to litigated disputes. Drawing on this experience, he cochairs the firm's transaction advisory opinion committees.

Before joining BVA, Mr. Fries was a senior valuation/litigation practitioner for a national financial consulting company. Prior to that, he was employed as a meteorologist.

Mr. Fries received a master of business administration from Texas Christian University where he graduated with honors and a bachelor of science in meteorology and agriculture journalism from Texas A&M University. He holds the Chartered Financial Analyst® (CFA) designation from the CFA Institute and the Accredited Senior Appraiser designation. He is a member of the American Society of Appraisers, CFA Institute, Dallas Society of Chartered Financial Analysts, and the Association for Corporate Growth.

Mr. Fries’s work has involved agencies, brokers, and financial institutions, with personal lines and excess and surplus lines and other specialty market providers including nonstandard auto, health care, workers compensation, and administrators.