Omar Amanat

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Omar S. Amanat is a U.S. businessman and entrepreneur. Named one of Wall Street's "Top Ten Most Influential Technologists" Mr Amanat was a pioneer in the electronic brokerage industry. [1] He began his entrepreneurial career at Datek Online, one of the pioneers in online brokerage services which was sold to Ameritrade for $1.3 billion. He left Datek to co-found CyberBlock, the predecessor of CyberTrader, Inc., which was acquired by Charles Schwab in 2000 for $488 million. [2] Most recently he was the founder, CEO and majority shareholder of Tradescape Corporation, a next-generation brokerage and technology firm for professional investors, that processed over 10% of NASDAQ's daily trading volume and was one of the largest electronic brokerage firms in the United States (by trading volume) in 2002 when he sold it to E*Trade for consideration worth $280 million, becoming one of E*Trade's largest shareholders. [3] Tradescape was named as one of the "Top 50 Private Companies" in the United States by Red Herring Magazine. [4]

Amanat attended the University of Pennsylvania and the Wharton School of Business where he is part of the Wharton School's Entrepreneur in Residence (EIR) faculty program. He is also the recipient of the prestigious Albert P. Einstein Technology award for outstanding corporate citizenship and sits on numerous boards including the Board of Trustees for the Harlem Youth Development Foundation, Human Rights Watch, is a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations, is a Trustee of the Democratic National Committee (DNC),and was recently the Vice Chairman of the Acumen Fund, which was named one of the "5 Charities changing the face of Global Philanthropy" by Barron's. [5]

He has been profiled in various media venues including Fortune Magazine, The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times, and is a frequent public speaker. [6]