Kent Oliver

Kent Oliver serves as Director of Strategic Growth and a Financial Advisor with Raanes & Oliver Capital Advisors, where he has worked since 2018 building relationships with clients throughout the Pine Belt and Gulf South. A Hattiesburg native, he earned his marketing degree from the University of Georgia in 2003 and spent the following decade in sales and marketing roles with two Fortune 500 companies, Newell Rubbermaid and Owens & Minor, before returning home to Hattiesburg to build his career in finance alongside business partner and long-term friend Brady Raanes.

Diagnosed with multiple myeloma at age 34 in 2015, Kent has spent the past decade turning that experience into advocacy for the myeloma community. In 2016, he founded Laughs 4 Life, an annual Hattiesburg comedy fundraiser that has raised and distributed nearly $1.6 million to its partner beneficiaries over the past ten years. Among the accomplishments that have come out of Laughs 4 Life include awarding eight research grants through the International Myeloma Foundation (IMF) as well as the funding of two Laughs 4 Life Smile Rooms at Childrens of Mississippi, the state’s only children’s hospital.  Kent now serves on the board of directors of the IMF and played an integral role in the development of Myelo™, the organization’s AI-powered patient chatbot.  He currently serves on the campaign committee for the University of Mississippi’s Cancer Center and Research Institute and previously held board appointments locally at the Forrest General Healthcare Foundation and the Pinebelt Foundation.

Kent and his wife, Candace, live in Hattiesburg, where they are raising their two daughters, Annie and Charlotte. Between his advisory practice and his advocacy work, Kent has built a career and a life centered on relationships and servant leadership — a commitment he now brings to his role with the Commission.