Profile
Curiosity is the thread running through Ilya Kudzelka’s career, from his start in fund accounting to his current role as Principal and Portfolio Manager, Research & Analytics at Westcourt Capital.
In investment research, he says, there is always another layer to understand: “I’ve always tried not to stop at knowing what happened. I want to understand why it happened and what sits behind it.”
Kudzelka arrived at that instinct through an unconventional route. “I’m originally from Belarus, and when I came to Canada, I had very little exposure to finance in the North American sense,” he says. “In many ways, discovering Canada and discovering the financial industry happened at the same time for me.”
His career began in the back office with private equity and private debt funds before he pursued the CFA program and a Master of Finance at Rotman. A pivotal moment came when he joined Westcourt during his master’s and moved into the type of investment work he had been building toward. Kudzelka credits that foundation with sharpening his due diligence skills today, since assessing a manager means examining its operations, not just its investment thesis. A naturally competitive, underdog mentality has pushed him as well to prove himself through the quality of his work.
A lesson from David Kaufman, Westcourt’s Founder and Co-CEO, has stayed with Kudzelka and shaped how he approaches that work. During a research meeting, Kaufman made the point that being comfortable saying “I don’t know” can be a powerful thing.
“That stuck with me because, particularly in investment research, there can be pressure to have an answer or a view on everything,” Kudzelka says. “Acknowledging that you don’t know something is not a weakness. It creates an opportunity to reset, question your assumptions, and figure out what information you are missing.”
He carries that same openness into his approach to leadership as his responsibilities at Westcourt have broadened. “I don’t think knowledge should sit in individual silos or depend too heavily on one person,” he says. “I try to make sure information, context, and lessons learned are shared across the team so that everyone can make better decisions and continue developing.”
Kudzelka applied that instinct to help build a portfolio optimization tool for Westcourt’s portfolio managers, replacing a time-consuming, Python-dependent process with one that lets managers test allocations and instantly review performance, volatility, correlations, and distribution characteristics.
Kudzelka frames his Rising Star recognition as a responsibility as much as a celebration. For him, the award raises the bar for what he wants to contribute to Westcourt and its clients.
Looking to the next three to five years, he is focused on how artificial intelligence and better data access could reshape private market due diligence, an area that has historically lagged public markets on available data. “I don’t think technology replaces investment judgment. The opportunity is to use it to process information more effectively, ask better questions, and give investment professionals more time to focus on the areas where judgment really matters.”
175 Bloor St E, Toronto, ON M4W 3R8
416 907 4950
info@westcourtcapital.com
linkedin.com/in/ilya-kudzelka-mfin-cfa-89a575168
westcourtcapital.com
Ilya Kudzelka
Principal and Portfolio Manager, Research & Analytics,
Westcourt Capital
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Bio
Milestones
2014–2018
2018–2022
2020–2022
2022–2025
2025–2026
Earned an Honours Bachelor of Commerce, specializing in Financial Services Management, from Seneca College, graduating with a 4.0 GPA, and receiving multiple scholarships, including awards from HSBC Bank Canada, TD Bank, and Scotiabank
2014–2018
Progressed to Manager on the Private Equity team at a leading fund administrator, overseeing fund accounting for private equity and private debt funds, managing client relationships, supervising financial reporting, and improving reporting processes and service-level completion times
2018–2022
Earned a Master of Finance from the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management, graduating with First Class Dean’s List recognition in both academic years
2020–2022
Joined Westcourt Capital’s Research and Analytics team and earned the Chartered Financial Analyst designation in 2022
Advanced through increasingly senior roles before becoming registered as a Portfolio Manager and Advising Representative
2022–2025
Appointed Principal and Portfolio Manager, Research & Analytics, at Westcourt Capital
Named one of Wealth Professional’s Rising Stars, recognizing his leadership, expertise, and contributions to investment research and due diligence
2025–2026
Milestones
“I know this seems pretty simple, but [my philosophy] is always doing what’s right for clients and not what is best for me”
Collin Bruce,
Dominion Lending Centres
“I had to crawl my way out of debt and build up my mortgage business. I never forget that feeling, and I try to never take a new lead for granted. Every deal counts”
Collin Bruce,
Dominion Lending Centres
The professional philosophy that underpins all of it is strikingly basic – and Bruce knows it. “I know this seems pretty simple,” he says, “but always doing what’s right for clients and not what is best for me. I never have to worry about something coming back to me from a previous client.”
He has helped clients through years-long credit rehabilitation without earning a cent along the way. He has never placed a client in a product he wasn’t prepared to fully stand behind. The result is a practice built on trust generating its own momentum: repeat business and referrals that arrive without prompting, from clients who know the difference between a broker who serves them and one who services a transaction.
In Alberta, where Bruce has built a particularly strong market presence, his name is amplified by a heavy advertising campaign across television and radio – channels he values not simply for reach but for credibility. The ads, he notes, help legitimize him in a market where clients are choosing who to trust with some of the largest financial decisions of their lives. Alongside that visibility, he has cultivated deep relationships with builders and financial planners, creating a diversified pipeline of leads that insulates the business against the inevitable swings of the rate cycle.
The operational side of the business has evolved with equal deliberateness. The appointment of a dedicated ‘Director of Wow’ – a role conceived to ensure every client interaction exceeds expectation – and the adoption of Dominion Lending Centres’ Gold Rush CRM platform have together driven a meaningful uplift in repeat client business over the past year.
The present year of 2026 brings its own complexities. With clients emerging from a period of historically low rates and confronting sharply higher mortgage costs, Bruce has tilted his focus toward refinancing – helping existing borrowers navigate a transition that, for many, has been genuinely painful. He is also investing in AI tools to sharpen lead generation and streamline internal processes, a measured embrace of technology from someone who has never confused efficiency with the thing it is meant to serve.