Ray Padrón, CPA, CFP®, CIMA®
ABOUT RAY
Ray is Brightworth’s Chief Executive Officer, leading strategic and management operations across the firm. In addition, as a Wealth Advisor, he provides comprehensive financial and investment advice to help clients achieve their financial goals and dreams. His experience working with senior executives and business owners and their complex transition and succession strategies helps him guide both Brightworth’s and his clients’ success.
Ray began his financial career with what is now PricewaterhouseCoopers, later working for the Marriott Corporation and then serving as Vice President of Accounting Operations and Financial Reporting for Finalco Group, Inc. In 1986, Ray became a Principal and Senior Vice President of Finance for Capital Associates, Inc., a regional venture capital firm that provided both capital and funding services for portfolio companies.
In 1988, Ray created ARC Financial Services, a financial planning firm that focused on the unique needs of business owners. He later merged that firm with Ron Blue Trust, a national wealth advisory firm, starting their Washington, D.C. and Baltimore, Md. branches and eventually becoming the Vice President of Practice Areas and Chief Financial Officer at the national headquarters in Atlanta.
Ray is a Certified Public Accountant and CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ practitioner. He has completed the Investment Management Consultants Association’s Investment Analyst Program at the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania and is a Certified Investment Management AnalystSM. In addition, he is an Accredited Estate Planner®, a Chartered Life Underwriter and a Chartered Financial Consultant. Ray has been named several times in Atlanta magazine's list of Five Star Wealth Managers*.
Ray is currently on the Board of Directors for the Georgia Chamber of Commerce as well as Junior Achievement of Georgia, the Executive Committee of the Buckhead Coalition, and is past President of CEO Netweavers, a community of CEOs and trusted advisors committed to helping and improving the Atlanta business community. He is also a founding board member of Matchbook Learning, a national non-profit K-12 school management organization focused on a unique blended, competency-based model of learning for struggling schools.
He is an active member of Business Executives for National Security (BENS), a non-profit organization focused on bringing the private sector together with our government partners to apply best business practice solutions to its most difficult national security challenges. In addition, Ray is a past member of the board of directors of the Financial Planning Association of Georgia, and a past chairman and board member of an international faith-based ministry.
Over the years Ray has been a frequent speaker to executives on retirement planning. He has also spoken on operational excellence within the financial planning and wealth management industry.
Ray and his wife, Sharon, have four grown children and ten grandchildren. His hobbies include international travel, golfing with friends, reading, and exercise.
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By helping our clients build, preserve, and be generous with their wealth, we empower them to spend more of their time and resources building their families, their businesses, their careers, and investing in their community at large.
Wealth is a powerful tool, but only if it’s used to empower us and the world to focus on what matters most!
