Ken Kencel

Ken is the President and CEO of Churchill Asset Management, an affiliate of Nuveen. He also serves as Chairman of the Board, President and CEO of Nuveen Churchill Direct Lending Corp. (NYSE: NCDL) and Nuveen Churchill Private Capital Income Fund (PCAP), Churchill’s publicly registered business development companies. Additionally, Ken is Chairman of Churchill’s Executive Committee and a member of the Senior Lending Investment Committee.

Previously, Ken served as a Managing Director of The Carlyle Group, where he also served as President and a Director of Carlyle Secured Lending, Inc. (Carlyle’s publicly traded business development company). Prior to that he founded and was President and CEO of Churchill Financial Group, served as Head of Leveraged Finance for Royal Bank of Canada and was Head of Indosuez Capital. Ken was also a founder of the high yield finance business at Chase Securities (now JP Morgan Chase). He began his career at Drexel Burnham Lambert. In 2023, Ken was named by Private Debt Investor as “One of the 30 ChangeMakers” who helped shape the industry over the past decade. And in 2025, Ken was recognized with a Lifetime Achievement Award by The M&A Advisor and inducted into their Hall of Fame.

Ken graduated with a B.S. in Business Administration, magna cum laude, from Georgetown University and a J.D. from Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law. He serves on the Pension Investment Advisory Committee for the Archdiocese of New York, the Board of Trustees and Chairman of the Investment Committee of Canisius High School, the Advisory Board of Teach for America (Connecticut), and the Milken Institute’s Inclusive Capitalism Executive Council.