Raymond J. Murphy, Jr, Esquire, is the Founder and Senior Editor of ArbJournal. Mr. Murphy has 25 years of experience in risk arbitrage research and consulting, following and researching literally thousands of transactions. During this tenure in the field, Mr. Murphy has worked in numerous capacities: economist, research analyst, attorney, consultant, entrepreneurial publisher and editor. This multifaceted background has provided Mr. Murphy with a deep, broad and historical perspective on the legal and regulatory issues germane to the practice of risk arbitrage. He founded ArbJournal in the summer of 2004.

Mr. Murphy began his career as an Economist with the U.S. Department of Commerce (Bureau of Economic Analysis), where he worked on GDP statistics and the Input/Output table of the U.S. economy. He spent three years as an economic analyst and research assistant to the antitrust and federal regulatory group at Squire, Sanders & Dempsey in its Washington, DC office, concentrating on risk arbitrage research and analysis. Mr. Murphy worked for two years as a trial lawyer in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where his practice included antitrust litigation and counseling, federal and state regulatory matters and civil and criminal litigation, including several jury trials. Prior to founding his original research service, Takeover Stock Report, in 1996, Mr. Murphy worked for two years as an attorney with a boutique consultancy in Washington, DC, advising arbitrage and distress-investment funds on legal and regulatory matters. Mr. Murphy received a B.A. in Economics from Marquette University and a J.D. from Duquesne University, where he was a member of the Duquesne Law Review. He also holds an LL.M. in Securities Regulation from Georgetown University.

Joining Mr. Murphy on the ArbJournal editorial team are the following Editors:

Karl Betz, Esquire, Editor-in-Chief, joined ArbJournal in 2005.  Prior to that, Mr. Betz was an Editor at Takeover Stock Report, where he researched and reported on both U.S. and European merger arbitrage situations. Since entering the merger arbitrage research field in 2003, Mr. Betz has specialized in financial services deals and complex antitrust and Delaware contract and corporate law issues. Mr. Betz began his career as a staff attorney with the Treasury Department's Office of the Comptroller of the Currency in Washington, DC, where he helped draft a number of the OCC’s regulations implementing the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act and worked on a number of the agency’s electronic banking initiatives. He then spent two years as an associate with Clifford Chance in New York, advising major U.S. and international financial institution clients on bank and broker-dealer legal and regulatory issues, and derivatives and structured finance transactions. Mr. Betz earned a B.A. from the University of Virginia and a J.D. from the Marshall-Wythe School of Law at the College of William and Mary.

Christopher J. Hagert, Esquire, Executive Editor, joined ArbJournal in 2005. Mr. Hagert is engaged in the analysis of U.S. and European merger arbitrage situations, particularly public utility and medical device deals (notably FSH / TMO and CEG / EXC). His focus is product research- and regulatory-intensive transactions. He also specializes in Canadian merger transaction research and analysis (including GG / NEM and KML / PBA). Mr. Hagert entered the merger arbitrage research field in 2003 as an Editor for Takeover Stock Report, where he researched and reported on deals in a wide range of industries, particularly those in the oil and gas and banking industries. Before joining Takeover Stock Report, Mr. Hagert spent two years as in-house corporate counsel for Richmond-based First North American National Bank, where he helped facilitate bank regulatory examinations and the development and implementation of the bank's compliance program. Prior to going in-house, Mr. Hagert spent two years as an associate attorney in the Washington, DC area law firm, Fossett & Brugger, where he was engaged in various aspects of the firm's diverse corporate practice. Mr. Hagert earned a B.A. in History and English from the University of Delaware and a J.D. from the University of Baltimore School of Law.

Petya Aladzhova is ArbJournal European Editor, joining the publication in the summer of 2011. She has researched majour arbitrage situations such as SKY, TNTE, JAZZ, SYNN, LIN, LSE, BG, MMI. Ms. Aladzhova has several years of experience as a qualified attorney with law firms in Bulgaria and has received an LL.M. in Competition Law from University College London. Her legal experience includes participation in due diligence exercises in the course of M&A transactions and the preparation of a regulatory notification for the acquisition of Bulgarian Telecommunications Company Plc. Ms. Aladzhova was associated with the Austrian law firm of Wolf Theiss, the largest firm for Central and Eastern Europe.  At the firm, Ms. Aladzhova worked with clients such as ExxonMobil, Visa Europe, Broadcom, Chanel, Novartis, Genzyme and LG on competition law and other regulatory matters. Ms. Aladzhova has been participating in an e-Competitions project for the editing of a competition bulletin on national and European competition issues and is an author at an EU law journal. She has also worked as a trainee at the European Court of Justice at the European Union. Ms. Aladzhova has a Master Degree in Law from Sofia University. She speaks Bulgarian, English and French.

Drew Labanoski joined ArbJournal in 2012 as an Editor and Director of Business Development. Drew has worked on hundreds of transactions since joining the team, including litigious transactions such as Cooper Tire (CTB) / Apollo Tyres, Rent-A-Center (RCII) / Vintage Capital Management, and Office Depot (ODP) / Staples (SPLS). Prior to that he was an analyst in the mergers and acquisitions group of the investment banking division of Key Bank, where he worked on a number of deals in a wide range of industries. His work included sell-side, buy-side, and private capital transactions. During his tenure in the M&A group he was awarded the Chairman’s award to recognize his role in a significant transaction. Mr. Labanoski received his B.A. in philosophy from Penn State University’s Schreyers Honors College, his M.B.A. with a focus in finance from the University of Pittsburgh’s Joseph M. Katz Graduate School of Business, and his J.D. from the University of Pittsburgh’s School of Law. He has held Series 7, 63, and 79 securities licenses.

Ximena Rojas Pacini, European Editor, is a senior associate in Aninat, Schwencke & Cia.’s Competition team in Santiago, Chile. She has vast experience in competition law, regulated markets and industries and international trade law. She received an LL.M degree in Competition Law from University College London in 2011. Previously, she worked for two years as legal officer at the Research Division of Chile’s Competition Authority where she participated in various investigations and market studies in different industries. Before joining the Competition Authority, Ms. Rojas Pacini was the Deputy Head of the Competition Policy and Trade Defense Department at the General Directorate of International Economic Affairs of the Chilean Ministry of Foreign Affairs, leading the competition and trade remedies chapters’ negotiation teams in several trade agreements (Chile-Australia; Chile-Japan; Chile-.Colombia, among others). She represented her country in the Rules negotiations at the World Trade Organization and participated in a number of antidumping, safeguards and subsidies investigations. She has also worked as an independent consultant, preparing legal opinions on an array of competition and regulatory issues (vertical integration of a regional Chilean underground; deregulation of the liquid fuels sector in Colombia; repeal of the liner conference exemption from Chilean Competition Law, among others). Ms. Rojas Pacini holds a law degree from the Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile (1997) and an LLM degree in Commercial and Corporate Law from the University of London (2001). She is a professor of International Trade Policy and WTO at Universidad Alberto Hurtado School of Law, in Santiago, Chile.

Svetlana Vardeva, European Editor, joined ArbJournal in the Spring of 2019. She has more than ten years of professional experience as a qualified lawyer, working for the Bulgarian branch of an international law firm with headquarters in Prague, the Czech Republic, and previously, in a top-tier Bulgarian law firm. Her practice was focused on corporate law, corporate governance and regulatory matters related to public companies. She consulted on a number of M&A transactions, particularly by performing legal due diligence and drafting and reviewing of transaction documents. She has experience also in the field of ICT law and telecommunications and co-authored several articles for the Getting the Deal Through Editions – in the E-Commerce and Telecoms and Media sections. Ms. Vardeva also worked as an intern in a Big Four firm while pursuing her Master Degree in Law in the Sofia University. She has completed an online course in Financial Accounting in Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. Ms. Vardeva speaks Bulgarian, English and Italian. Since joining the ArbJournal team, she has been engaged in the research and coverage of TL5/MS deal, UK implications of PACB/ILMN deal, and others.

Brian Reid rejoined ArbJournal in March 2024 as an Editor. He previously worked at ArbJournal from 2013 to 2022 and worked on hundreds of transactions, including litigious transactions such as Office Depot (ODP) / Staples (SPLS), Rent-A-Center (RCII) / Vintage Capital Management, Humana (HUM) / Aetna (AET), Cigna (CI) / Anthem (ANTM), and Change Healthcare (CHNG) / UnitedHealth Group (UNH). Prior to returning to ArbJournal, he worked in Risk Management at Capital One where he was a Business Analyst and worked to maintain a suite of commercial credit risk models. Mr. Reid received a B.S. in Mathematics from Longwood University and his M.B.A. from the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia.