Shane Mengel
Shane Mengel is a founding partner of Pacific & Plains Capital, a Dallas-based alternative credit investment firm. He serves on its three-person governing Executive Committee, its Investment Committee and its ESG Screening Committee overseeing all of the firm’s investment activities, capital commitments, and investment strategy.
Mr. Mengel began his investment career in 1999 at Ares Management, a Los Angeles based alternative asset management firm where he worked for seventeen years until his retirement as a partner in 2016. As a senior executive at Ares, he held several positions including co-head of research, client portfolio manager and investment research analyst in its credit division specializing in below investment grade fixed income.
Between 2014 and 2016, Mr. Mengel identified and led a new initiative at Ares focused on expanding and coordinating efforts between the credit and business development divisions to identify new business opportunities primarily with family offices and consultants.
Between 2012 and 2014, Mr. Mengel served as co-head of research whereby he oversaw a team of 40 research analysts in Los Angeles and London and all related investment activities for Ares’ credit division, which managed approximately $30 billion of assets across the firm’s fixed income strategies. In this capacity he was also responsible for managing approximately $2 billion of syndicated loans, high yield bonds and post-reorganization equity investments in the chemical and metals & mining sectors. These investments spanned the breadth of the firm’s fixed income strategies including its flagship long-short credit hedge fund, collateralized loan obligations (CLOs), separate accounts and co-mingled funds investing in high yield bonds and syndicated loans, and distressed special situations. Mr. Mengel also served as co-head of the firm’s cross sourcing effort, which focused on maximizing efficiency related to cross pollination of research and identifying investment synergies across the entire Ares investment platform.
Between 1999 and 2012, Mr. Mengel was an investment research analyst for Ares, responsible for identifying, evaluating and recommending investments in high yield bonds and syndicated loans. During this time, he covered numerous industries including aerospace & defense, chemicals, homebuilding, environmental services, forest products, industrials, metals & mining, and real estate services.
Between 1997 and 1999, Mr. Mengel worked at the Los Angeles offices of Price Waterhouse LLP most recently as a senior consultant in its Transaction Services Group where he led mergers and acquisitions due diligence engagements for clients including both financial and strategic buyers. He originally joined the firm’s audit practice where he focused on business assurance services for clients in the aerospace & defense, entertainment and manufacturing industries.
Between 1994 and 1996, Mr. Mengel worked in the Philadelphia offices of Grant Thornton LLP and AG Epstein Company where he directed business assurance engagements for various clients conducting business in the non-profit and manufacturing sectors.
Mr. Mengel is a graduate of Villanova University, where he earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Accountancy in May 1994. He has been active in Villanova’s Alumni Interview Program since 2010 and has served as a Mentor in the Villanova School of Business Mentor Program since 2018.
