Thomas S. Ricketts earned his bachelor's degree from the University of Chicago in 1987 and his MBA from Chicago Booth in 1993. After stints at the Chicago Board Options Exhange, J.W. Korth & Company, Mesirow Financial Inc., and ABN AMRO, Ricketts struck out on his own.
In October 1999, he and a partner formed Integrated Investments to sell corporate bonds to wealthy individual investors. The firm became Incapital, an electronic investment bank specializing in the underwriting of debt products to the retail market. By 2005, its flagship program, InterNotes, a joint venture with Bank of America Securities, was selling nearly $1 billion in corporate bonds per month. In late 2003, Incapital LLC and Bank of America Corporation announced that they would launch Inflation-Protected InterNotes SM (IPIs), a new corporate bond program designed to protect retail investors against potential inflation.
Through his innovative platform, Ricketts has revolutionized the way major corporations sell bonds to the retail market. Incapital has established a permanent role for individual investors in the heavily institutionalized world of fixed income underwriting worldwide.