Alt Funds Network

Background: Phoenix Hafen is the director of advisor solutions at UI Charitable. He is an expert in charitable planning and spends a lot of time working with financial advisors and high net worth families to maximize the tax efficiency and outcomes of their charitable giving. Description: On the Alt Funds podcast, Skyler Steinke speaks with Phoenix Haven, Director of Advisor Solutions at UI Charitable, about helping financial advisors and high-net-worth families align charitable outcomes with tax efficiency. Haven explains why donating cash is typically the least tax-efficient approach and highlights donating appreciated or “problem” assets such as public securities, real estate, private business interests, cryptocurrency, and other alternatives to avoid capital gains. He offers a framework for evaluating charities based on measurable outcomes rather than expense ratios and explains how donor-advised funds (DAFs) work, how they compare to private foundations, and when each is appropriate. The conversation also covers donating business interests before an exit, appraisal and timing considerations, UBIT issues for S corps, DAFs as potential LP capital for fund managers, and custody solutions including multi-sig Bitcoin wallets.

Background: Dani Lynn Robison is the founder and CEO of Freedom Family Investments, a vertically integrated real estate investment platform that has deployed $1.9B+ across multifamily, senior housing, and self-storage. Over 25 years of investing and through every major market cycle — 2008, COVID, and the 2022 rate hike — she's maintained a 100% on-time investor payout record. Description: Alt Funds Network hosts Mike Schroeder and Skyler Steinke interview Dani Lynn Robison, founder and CEO of Freedom Family Investments, a vertically integrated real estate platform with a collective $1.9B deployed across multifamily, senior housing, and self-storage. Dani shares how she entered real estate in 2008 after careers in financial services, mortgage, and M&A, built a turnkey rental business with vertically integrated companies, then pivoted to apartments and fund management after buying a troubled 56-unit complex during COVID that she turned around in 18 months for a $2M gain. She explains her investor-first fund structure (8–14% pref equity, income and growth tracks), raising over $35M via word of mouth and podcasting, and why trust, operator vetting, and needs-based assets—especially senior housing—matter. She also discusses masterminds, burnout, defining freedom, and her book Calm Money Never Panics.

Background: Matteo Pandolfi is the co-founder and CEO of Pareto, an onchain private credit marketplace for institutional borrowers and lenders, with over $200M in TVL and over $2.5B in credit extended. Thibault Labidi is the Director of M11 Credit, experts in on-chain and off-chain deal structuring who bring fixed-income opportunities to capital allocators. The M11 team underwrote the FalconX Credit Vault on Pareto — the largest single-borrower vault in DeFi. Description: In this episode of Alt Funds Network, Mike Schroeder and co-host Skyler Steinke sit down with Matteo Pandolfi, Co-founder & CEO of Pareto, and Thibault Labidi, Director of M11 Credit, to explore how institutional lending is moving on-chain—and why the next wave of private credit may extend far beyond crypto. Pareto has grown to over $200M in Total Value Locked (TVL) and more than $2.5B in credit extended, evolving from a crypto-native lending platform into institutional-grade credit infrastructure. Together with M11 Credit, they explain how rigorous underwriting, legal protections, and transparent on-chain infrastructure are attracting institutional borrowers and lenders alike. The conversation takes a deep dive into the FalconX Credit Vault, one of the largest single-borrower on-chain credit facilities, covering how the deal was structured, how risk is managed, and how TradFi legal frameworks work alongside smart contracts to create institutional confidence. They also discuss why expanding into fintech and paytech borrowers could reduce dependence on crypto market cycles, how receipt tokens unlock new opportunities through DeFi composability, the role of curators and collateral agents, current market yields, operational efficiencies, and what Pareto's upcoming Pareto Studio means for the future of on-chain credit infrastructure. Whether you're an institutional investor, family office, DeFi builder, or simply interested in the future of private markets, this episode offers a practical look at where institutional capital is heading.