James Silk

Executive Vice President

Chief Legal Officer

A senior counselor with more than 20 years of experience in the financial services space, James G. Silk is the Executive Vice President and Chief Legal Officer of Beneficient.

Mr. Silk leads Ben’s underwriting and risk groups as well as overseeing Ben’s legal and compliance team. Prior to joining Ben in 2020, Mr. Silk was a Partner in the Asset Management Group of the international law firm of Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP, where he worked for more than 13 years. Prior to that position, Mr. Silk was an attorney at the international law firm Shearman and Sterling LLP.

Throughout his career, Mr. Silk has advised clients on a wide variety of business and legal issues across the alternative assets space. He has counseled many of the industry’s largest and most recognizable public and private asset management firms, including Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank, Credit Suisse, KKR, Brookfield, Bank of America Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley. Mr. Silk has extensive expertise on developing alternative asset products, and negotiating asset management M&A and similar corporate transactions.

Mr. Silk graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Finance from the University of Virginia and earned a law degree from St. John’s University School of Law.