Ruth Porat (born 1957) is a British-American business executive who is the president and chief investment officer of

Alphabet An alphabet is a standard set of letter (alphabet), letters written to represent particular sounds in a spoken language. Specifically, letters largely correspond to phonemes as the smallest sound segments that can distinguish one word from a ...

and its subsidiary Google, LLC and prior to that was the

chief financial officer A chief financial officer (CFO) is an officer of a company or organization who is assigned the primary responsibility for making decisions for the company for projects and its finances; i.a.: financial planning, management of financial risks, ...

of the same companies from 2015 to 2024. Prior to joining

Google Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...

, Porat was the executive vice president & chief financial officer of

Morgan Stanley Morgan Stanley is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company headquartered at 1585 Broadway in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. With offices in 42 countries and more than 80,000 employees, the firm's clients in ...

from January 2010 to May 2015. In 2024, Porat was listed as the 12th most powerful woman in the world by ''

Forbes ''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine founded by B. C. Forbes in 1917. It has been owned by the Hong Kong–based investment group Integrated Whale Media Investments since 2014. Its chairman and editor-in-chief is Steve Forbes. The co ...

'', and sixth on '' Fortune'' Most Powerful Women list.

Early life and education

Porat was born to a

Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

family in Sale, Cheshire, England, the daughter of Dan and Frieda Porat. Her mother was born in

Mandatory Palestine Mandatory Palestine was a British Empire, British geopolitical entity that existed between 1920 and 1948 in the Palestine (region), region of Palestine, and after 1922, under the terms of the League of Nations's Mandate for Palestine. After ...

, and her father fled Vienna on Kristallnacht and found his way to Mandatory Palestine, enlisted in the British Army as a teenager and later fought in the

1948 Arab–Israeli War The 1948 Arab–Israeli War, also known as the First Arab–Israeli War, followed the 1947–1948 civil war in Mandatory Palestine, civil war in Mandatory Palestine as the second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine war. The civil war becam ...

. Her father's testimony about surviving

Nazi German Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a totalitarian dictat ...

persecution of Jews was taken by the USC Shoah Foundation Institute in 1996. She has a brother, Marc Porat, who founded General Magic. Porat moved at a young age to

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It is a suburb in the Greater Boston metropolitan area, located directly across the Charles River from Boston. The city's population as of the 2020 United States census, ...

, where her father was a research fellow in the physics department at

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

. His visa was sponsored by John F. Kennedy, then a U.S. Senator. A byproduct of her father's research was

ion implantation Ion implantation is a low-temperature process by which ions of one element are accelerated into a solid target, thereby changing the target's physical, chemical, or electrical properties. Ion implantation is used in semiconductor device fabrica ...

, which found application in the development of the

semiconductor A semiconductor is a material with electrical conductivity between that of a conductor and an insulator. Its conductivity can be modified by adding impurities (" doping") to its crystal structure. When two regions with different doping level ...

. Three years later, her father relocated the family to

Palo Alto, California Palo Alto ( ; Spanish language, Spanish for ) is a charter city in northwestern Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a Sequoia sempervirens, coastal redwood tree known as El Palo Alto. Th ...

, where he worked at

Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...

SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, originally named the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, is a Federally funded research and development centers, federally funded research and development center in Menlo Park, California, Menlo Park, Ca ...

for 26 years. At SLAC he developed a spark chamber

spectrometer A spectrometer () is a scientific instrument used to separate and measure Spectrum, spectral components of a physical phenomenon. Spectrometer is a broad term often used to describe instruments that measure a continuous variable of a phenomeno ...

used in the discovery of

subatomic particles In physics, a subatomic particle is a particle smaller than an atom. According to the Standard Model of particle physics, a subatomic particle can be either a composite particle, which is composed of other particles (for example, a baryon, like ...

for which SLAC Director Burton Richter was awarded the

Nobel Prize in Physics The Nobel Prize in Physics () is an annual award given by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences for those who have made the most outstanding contributions to mankind in the field of physics. It is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the ...

in 1976. He worked closely with

Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; ; ) are awards administered by the Nobel Foundation and granted in accordance with the principle of "for the greatest benefit to humankind". The prizes were first awarded in 1901, marking the fifth anniversary of Alfred N ...

-laureate Melvin Schwartz and Stanley Wojcicki, father of Porat's future colleague Susan Wojcicki. Porat holds a B.A. in economics and international relations from

, a M.Sc. in

industrial relations Industrial relations or employment relations is the multidisciplinary academic field that studies the employment relationship; that is, the complex interrelations between employers and employees, labor union, labor/trade unions, employer organ ...

from the

London School of Economics The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), established in 1895, is a public research university in London, England, and a member institution of the University of London. The school specialises in the social sciences. Founded ...

, and a M.B.A. with distinction from the

Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania The Wharton School ( ) is the business school of the University of Pennsylvania, a private Ivy League research university in Philadelphia. Established in 1881 through a donation from Joseph Wharton, a co-founder of Bethlehem Steel, the Wharton ...

Career

Morgan Stanley

Porat began her career at

in 1987 and left in 1993 to follow Morgan Stanley president Robert F. Greenhill to Smith Barney and returned to Morgan Stanley in 1996. Before becoming CFO, she served as vice chairman of investment banking from September 2003 to December 2009 and the global head of the Financial Institutions Group from September 2006 to December 2009. She was previously co-head of technology investment banking and worked for Morgan Stanley in London. While a banker at Morgan Stanley, she was credited with creating the European debt financing that saved

Amazon Amazon most often refers to: * Amazon River, in South America * Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin * Amazon (company), an American multinational technology company * Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek myth ...

from collapse during the dot-com melt down in 2000. Her financial partner during the

Dot-com bubble The dot-com bubble (or dot-com boom) was a stock market bubble that ballooned during the late-1990s and peaked on Friday, March 10, 2000. This period of market growth coincided with the widespread adoption of the World Wide Web and the Interne ...

was Mary Meeker, the godmother to Porat's three children. In a 2014,

Politico ''Politico'' (stylized in all caps), known originally as ''The Politico'', is an American political digital newspaper company founded by American banker and media executive Robert Allbritton in 2007. It covers politics and policy in the Unit ...

published an articled titled "Porat: The Most Powerful Woman On Wall Street". During the

2008 financial crisis The 2008 financial crisis, also known as the global financial crisis (GFC), was a major worldwide financial crisis centered in the United States. The causes of the 2008 crisis included excessive speculation on housing values by both homeowners ...

, Porat led the Morgan Stanley team advising the

United States Department of the Treasury The Department of the Treasury (USDT) is the Treasury, national treasury and finance department of the federal government of the United States. It is one of 15 current United States federal executive departments, U.S. government departments. ...

regarding

Fannie Mae The Federal National Mortgage Association (FNMA), commonly known as Fannie Mae, is a United States government-sponsored enterprise (GSE) and, since 1968, a publicly traded company. Founded in 1938 during the Great Depression as part of the New ...

and

Freddie Mac The Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (FHLMC), commonly known as Freddie Mac, is an American publicly traded, government-sponsored enterprise (GSE), headquartered in Tysons, Virginia.New York Federal Reserve Bank with respect to

AIG American International Group, Inc. (AIG) is an American multinational finance and insurance corporation with operations in more than 80 countries and jurisdictions. As of 2023, AIG employed 25,200 people. The company operates through three core ...

. In May 2011, she presented to the Bretton Woods Committee hosted by the

International Monetary Fund The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is a major financial agency of the United Nations, and an international financial institution funded by 191 member countries, with headquarters in Washington, D.C. It is regarded as the global lender of las ...

in Washington, D.C., on post-crisis reform and financial legislation, and to the

World Economic Forum The World Economic Forum (WEF) is an international non-governmental organization, international advocacy non-governmental organization and think tank, based in Cologny, Canton of Geneva, Switzerland. It was founded on 24 January 1971 by German ...

in Davos in 2013 on "trust" levels within and of the financial sector. In 2013, it was reported that President

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...

would nominate Porat as the next

Deputy Secretary of the Treasury The deputy secretary of the treasury of the United States advises and assists the Secretary of the Treasury in the supervision and direction of the United States Department of the Treasury, Department of the Treasury and its activities, and succ ...

. However, it was reported later by ''

Bloomberg News Bloomberg News (originally Bloomberg Business News) is an international news agency headquartered in New York City and a division of Bloomberg L.P. Content produced by Bloomberg News is disseminated through Bloomberg Terminals, Bloomberg T ...

'' and ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'' that Porat had contacted White House officials to withdraw her name from consideration because of improving conditions at Morgan Stanley and the acrimonious confirmation process inflicted upon then Treasury Secretary-nominee Jack Lew. Porat's career was analyzed in the McKinsey & Company study "How Remarkable Women Lead". She was named "Best Financial Institutions CFO" in a poll conducted by ''

Institutional Investor An institutional investor is an entity that pools money to purchase securities, real property, and other investment assets or originate loans. Institutional investors include commercial banks, central banks, credit unions, government-linked ...

'' for its "2014 All-America Executive Team".

Google

On March 24, 2015, it was announced that Porat would join

as its new CFO as of May 26, 2015. ''Bloomberg Business'' reported that her hiring deal amounted to $70 million. She has been credited with boosting Google's share price by reorganizing the company and imposing financial discipline. For the "2018 All America Executive Team", she was named "Best Internet CFO" by ''

''. Porat spoke at the '' Fortune'' Most Powerful Women Summit in Dana Point, California, on October 19, 2016, in her capacity as CFO of Alphabet Inc. and

. At

, in addition to Finance, Porat also has Business Operations, Real Estate and Work Place Services reporting to her. She was paid $50 million in 2020, $47 million in 2018, and $39 million in 2016. In July 2023, Porat was promoted to the newly created role of president and chief investment officer of Alphabet and Google starting from September 1, 2023. Her responsibilities include overseeing the company's "Other Bets" ventures, its private equity portfolios, and its investments in real estate, infrastructure and data centers.

Board membership

She is a member of the Board of Directors of

Management Company, the university's endowment, the Board of Trustees of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, the Board of Directors of The Council on Foreign Relations, the Board of Directors of Bloomberg Philanthropies, and the Board of Directors of

The Blackstone Group Blackstone Inc. is an American alternative investment management company based in New York City. It was founded in 1985 as a mergers and acquisitions firm by Peter G. Peterson, Peter Peterson and Stephen A. Schwarzman, Stephen Schwarzman, who h ...

. She previously served on the Board of Trustees of

, the Borrowing Advisory Committee of the United States Treasury, and the Board of Trustees of the Economic Club of New York. She is a member of the Advisory Council of the Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy at the

Brookings Institution The Brookings Institution, often stylized as Brookings, is an American think tank that conducts research and education in the social sciences, primarily in economics (and tax policy), metropolitan policy, governance, foreign policy, global econo ...

, and the Economic Strategy Group at the Aspen Institute.

Political views

Porat supported

Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton ( Rodham; born October 26, 1947) is an American politician, lawyer and diplomat. She was the 67th United States secretary of state in the administration of Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013, a U.S. senator represent ...

for president in 2008 and 2016, hosting fundraisers for her at the Dakota in New York City. In 2011, Porat expressed her support for increased taxes on the wealthy and declared on the topic of significant spending decreases that "we cannot cut our way to greatness". In March 2025, San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie named Porat as co-chair of "The Partnership for San Francisco" alongside

Laurene Powell Jobs Laurene Powell Jobs ( Powell; born November 6, 1963)United States birth records is an American billionaire businesswoman executive and philanthropist. She is the widow of Steve Jobs, who was the co-founder and former CEO of Apple Inc., and she m ...

Personal life

Porat has been married to Anthony Paduano, a partner in the law firm Paduano & Weintraub, since 1983. Porat is a survivor of

breast cancer Breast cancer is a cancer that develops from breast tissue. Signs of breast cancer may include a Breast lump, lump in the breast, a change in breast shape, dimpling of the skin, Milk-rejection sign, milk rejection, fluid coming from the nipp ...

. In September 2015, Porat reportedly paid $30 million for a house in

Palo Alto Palo Alto ( ; Spanish language, Spanish for ) is a charter city in northwestern Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a Sequoia sempervirens, coastal redwood tree known as El Palo Alto. Th ...

. In 2016, she gave the commencement address for graduates of the

Wharton School The Wharton School ( ) is the business school of the University of Pennsylvania, a private Ivy League research university in Philadelphia. Established in 1881 through a donation from Joseph Wharton, a co-founder of Bethlehem Steel, the Wharton ...

In popular culture

In the 2011

HBO Home Box Office (HBO) is an American pay television service, which is the flagship property of namesake parent-subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office business unit is based a ...

movie ''

Too Big to Fail "Too big to fail" (TBTF) is a theory in banking and finance that asserts that certain corporations, particularly financial institutions, are so large and so interconnected with an economy that their failure would be disastrous to the greater e ...

'', Porat is played by Jennifer van Dyck.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Porat, Ruth 1957 births Living people American chief financial officers American financial businesspeople American people of English-Jewish descent American women business executives British emigrants to the United States Alumni of the London School of Economics Stanford University alumni Directors of Morgan Stanley Morgan Stanley employees Google employees Alphabet Inc. people Women chief financial officers Women financial analysts Stanford University trustees 21st-century American women