Closing the gap between markets and the people who depend on them.
I've spent my career at the intersection of markets, operations, and technology — from managing institutional portfolios to brokering commodities for Midwest farmers to building AI-powered systems at a SaaS startup.
It started at Bell Bank, where I was part of a team managing $5B in assets for high-net-worth clients. Then I moved to the other side of the table as a commodity broker, working directly with farmers and producers across the upper Midwest. Soybeans, corn, wheat, cattle, crude — I helped them manage risk through futures and options, translating market complexity into decisions they could act on.
That experience showed me how broken the tools were. The people closest to the markets had the worst infrastructure. So I moved into technology — first streamlining trade operations at a wealth advisory firm, then as Director of Operations at Miiflo, where I've built AI-powered systems, a risk management dashboard, and the operational backbone for a growing SaaS company.
The thread through all of it: I find the gap between what markets are doing and what the people in them actually need, then I build the system to close it.
Early team member since near-inception. Miiflo builds risk management tools for financial advisors, and Dan owns the operational and technical infrastructure that keeps the company running.
The dashboard wasn't a pre-planned project — Dan identified the gap in internal tooling, taught himself the stack (Node.js, Supabase, Netlify), and built it from scratch. The CEO valued it at $250K+ because getting equivalent functionality from a development agency would have cost that or more.
The AI systems are similarly self-built: a Slack bot that synthesizes daily briefings from Notion, email, and calendar data; automated task workflows that parse meeting notes into actionable items; and a notification infrastructure that routes alerts across Slack, email, and webhooks.
This role is where all three pillars converge: market expertise (model portfolio management), operations (team leadership, process design), and technology (building production systems from scratch).
This role bridged Dan's commodity brokerage experience with his eventual move into SaaS operations. Working at a tax-focused wealth advisory firm gave him exposure to a different client base (HNW individuals vs. agricultural producers) and a different operational model (advisory vs. brokerage).
The workflow improvements he made here planted the seed for the operational systems thinking he'd later bring to Miiflo. He saw firsthand how manual processes in trade execution and data reconciliation created unnecessary friction and risk.
This was the formative role. Dan worked directly with farmers managing operations from 250 to 7,500 acres, helping them hedge crop and livestock exposure. Orders cleared through RCG Chicago.
The real skill wasn't execution — it was behavioral coaching. Agricultural producers face enormous emotional pressure during volatile markets. Dan's job was to keep them disciplined: stick to the plan, manage risk systematically, don't chase markets on fear or greed. He became a trusted advisor, not just a broker.
The option selling specialization was distinctive. Rather than speculative directional bets, Dan built strategies around selling premium — harvesting time decay with high-probability setups. This required deep understanding of both the technical (Greeks, volatility surfaces) and the practical (crop cycles, basis risk, delivery logistics).
This experience is what makes Dan rare in tech: he doesn't just understand markets theoretically. He's sat across the kitchen table from a farmer deciding whether to hedge next year's crop, and he knows what information they actually need vs. what the tools give them.
Dan wrote market analysis for a subscriber-based financial media platform while simultaneously brokering commodities at Van Ahn. This dual role sharpened his ability to translate complex market dynamics into clear, actionable writing — a skill that shows up in everything from his Slack briefing systems to client presentations.
Dan started at Bell Bank as a teller in December 2013 while completing his finance degree at NDSU. He progressed through a wealth management internship to a full Portfolio Manager role in under two years — a trajectory that reflected both capability and initiative.
On the team, he collaborated with trust and retirement officers on asset allocation and economic forecasting. The CIO mentorship gave him institutional-grade thinking about portfolio construction, risk budgeting, and the discipline of managing other people's money at scale.
This is where Dan's market foundation was built. The combination of a CMT designation, $5B AUM exposure, and hands-on backtesting work gave him a quantitative and systematic approach to markets that he carried into every subsequent role.
Paste a job description below. The AI will analyze it against my actual experience and give you an honest assessment — including where the fit is weak. This saves both of us time.