Board of Directors

Paul Cusenza

Paul Cusenza is Chairman and CEO of Nodal Exchange, LLC and Nodal Clear, LLC. Paul has over forty years of experience in building and managing businesses. He was a co-Founder and co-President of 23andMe, a personal genetics company, and the Senior Vice President of Marketing and Alliance Management at Perlegen Sciences. He was part of the Senior Management Team of Capital One Financial during a period of great growth in the 1990s, as the Managing Director of Value-Added Alliances and Vice President Marketing & Analysis. Prior to Capital One Financial, Paul was a Vice President and Partner at Mercer Management Consulting (now Oliver Wyman) for nearly a decade focusing on financial services. He also worked for IBM early in his career. Paul Cusenza holds a Master of Business Administration degree from the Harvard Business School and a B.S.E. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Michigan.

Tobias Paulun

Dr. Tobias Paulun has been CEO of European Commodity Clearing AG (ECC) since 1st April 2023. From January 2015 to March 2023, he held the position of Chief Strategy Officer within the Management Board of EEX. Tobias Paulun has been with EEX Group since August 2009, when he started in product development and later headed the strategy department of EEX. He has also been a member of the Management Board of EPEX SPOT and Managing Director Exchange at EEX. Previously, he worked at the Institute of Electrical Systems and Energy Economics (IAEW) of RWTH Aachen University with a focus on the long-term development of the European electricity market and optimization of grid expansion of electricity and gas networks.

Steven B. Perfect

Dr. Steven Perfect serves as a Public Director of Nodal Exchange, LLC and Nodal Clear, LLC. He is an Associate Professor in the Department of Finance at Florida State University teaching derivatives, investments, and portfolio management in the Masters of Business Administration and Masters of Science in Finance programs. Prior to returning to Florida State’s faculty in 2012, Dr. Perfect was with NextEra Energy (formerly FPL Group) for over a decade. He was the Senior Director of Option Trading & Quantitative Analysis at NextEra Energy Resources, where he managed energy derivatives traders and trading analysts as well as overseeing quantitative and risk analysis. He was also formerly the Senior Director of Transmission Trading for FPL Energy. Prior to NextEra Energy he worked at Sonat Energy Services / El Paso Merchant Energy in risk strategy for two years and taught at Florida State University for seven years achieving tenure while teaching at the undergraduate and doctoral level in finance. Dr. Steven Perfect has been qualified as a Chartered Financial Analyst since 1998. He is a former Board Member of the Eastern Finance Association. Dr. Steven Perfect earned a B.S. in Physics from Oklahoma State University and a Masters of Business Administration and Ph.D. in Finance both from The University of Texas at Austin.

Ann Sacra

Dr. Ann Sacra serves as a Public Director for Nodal Exchange, LLC and Nodal Clear, LLC. She retired from Nodal Exchange in 2016. At the time of her retirement, she was the President and Chief Operating Officer of Nodal Exchange and Nodal Clear, as well as the Chief Risk Officer of Nodal Clear. Dr. Sacra joined Nodal Exchange shortly after its creation in 2007, and was involved in all aspects of the Exchange and Clearing House development, including Nodal Exchange’s initial launch, the launch of Nodal Exchange as a Designated Contract Market, and the launch of Nodal Clear. Prior to joining Nodal Exchange, she was a partner at a hedge fund and a manager at Dean & Company. Dr. Ann Sacra holds a Ph.D in Physical Chemistry from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a B.A. in Chemistry and Physics from Harvard University.