Chris Hayes

President, RedLine Strategies LLC

Chris Hayes is a Partner at Thorn Run Partners focusing on the intersection of financial services and technology, including digital assets and artificial intelligence (AI). He brings over 15 years of financial regulatory and strategic policy expertise to his clients. Before joining Thorn Run, Chris co-founded and led as President a boutique consulting firm called Capitol Asset Strategies.

Chris has also held senior in-house policy roles across both the digital assets and traditional financial services industries. Most recently, he led global government relations for the Celo Layer-1 blockchain and directed U.S. government relations for Sorare SAS, a SoftBank-backed NFT platform.

Before entering the blockchain sector, Chris spent five years building and leading the global advocacy program at the Institutional Limited Partners Association (ILPA), representing more than 650 institutional investors investing $2 trillion in AUM in private funds. At ILPA, he also spearheaded legal best practices initiatives and worked closely with in-house legal teams at leading limited partners, as well as led the organization’s global policy engagement in the U.S. and Europe.

Earlier in his career, Chris served as General Counsel and co-led government affairs for the Small Business Investor Alliance (SBIA), the national association representing Business Development Companies (BDCs), U.S. middle-market private equity firms, and Small Business Investment Companies (SBICs). He also worked at the Financial Services Institute (FSI), at FINRA, and served as a legal fellow on the Senate Banking Committee during the drafting of the Dodd-Frank Act.

Chris remains active as an advisor, investor, and fundraiser in the private markets. He previously served as an advisor to Aumni, Inc., a private fund legal analytics platform acquired by JP Morgan, and sits on the advisory board of Steward Asset Management, a strategic investor in emerging and diverse private equity and opportunistic managers.

He holds a J.D. from the University of San Diego School of Law and a B.A. in Political Science and Legal Studies from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Chris is admitted to the bar in California and the District of Columbia. Chris lives in Washington, D.C. with his wife, Catherine, and their two young daughters, Savannah and Caroline.

Advisory Work Experiences:

  • Serve on the Advisory Board of a anchor investor fund of funds, raising Fund 1.  Provide feedback on potential GPs in their pipeline, as well as capital introductions to public pension, family office, and endowment LPs.  Help them understand and navigate the SBIC licensing process.
  • Serve as an Advisor to a startup digital asset custody software business, helping them understand and navigate SEC regulations to ensure their product will be usable by key customers.
  • Served as an Advisor to a successful Fintech company, Aumni on their efforts to build a product to sell to LP legal counsel.  Provided extensive feedback on the product, made a variety of sales introductions, and represented the firm at key conferences.  Aumni was sold for a significant valuation to JP Morgan in 2023.

Policy Accomplishments for Clients:

Chris’s policy achievements include:
  • Successfully inserting the provisions that permitted tokenized money market funds ("MMFs) registered under the Investment Company Act of 1940 to qualify as reserve collateral for payment stablecoins under the GENIUS Act.
  • Leading a successful advocacy effort before Congress on behalf of clients to pass the first digital assets legislation into law,  the repeal of the IRS Broker Rule in early 2025.
  • Shaping the EU’s Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) legislation, with a particular focus on stablecoin and native Layer-1 token regulations.
  • Developing and executing a successful public policy platform for a Layer-1 blockchain project focused on tokenized carbon credits.
  • Led multiple successful advocacy campaigns in Congress and at the SEC in the private funds space for GPs and LPs.
  • Successfully achieved ILPA’s policy agenda at the SEC, resulting in groundbreaking rule changes for private funds.
  • Successfully achieved amendments to AIFMD II on behalf of clients.
  • Worked as part of a coalition to ensure US public pensions were not taxed as part of the 2017 tax reform legislation. 
  • Working to pass bipartisan legislation as one of the first rollbacks to Dodd-Frank, adjusting the private fund adviser SEC registration calculation of 150MM under the Investment Advisers Act.
  • Conducted extensive advocacy engagement at the SEC on the AFFE rule for BDCs, and the ability for BDCs to access 2:1 leverage, resulting in the successful passage of legislation to permit additional 2:1 leverage for BDCs.
  • Spearheaded the passage of legislation that created an office of the Advocate for Small Business Capital Formation, and a permanent Small Business Capital Formation Advisory Committee at the SEC.
  • Led a project team of external lawyers that created the first free, publicly available model limited partnership agreement (LPA) for private funds, which was released to the industry by ILPA.
  • Created a network of in-house legal professionals at institutional LPs, as well as an industry-leading conference, the ILPA Legal Conference (LCON), which focused on navigating investment fund terms in private equity.