OUR SPEAKERS
Robert Courtneidge
Independent Payment Industry Expert
Robert Courtneidge is valued and respected industry expert in the emerging payments industry. He is working with a number of businesses assisting them on their strategy and products using his 30+ years legal experience to give them practical and innovative solutions. He is co-author and Editor of The PAYTECH Book 2020. He was co-founder of the Prepaid International Forum and has worked with the Emerging Payments Association since it was founded.
He has been regularly featured in the prestigious Payments Power 10 (including being ranked #1 in 2015), a highly competitive ranking of the most influential contributors in payments. As a lawyer in payments he was voted in the top 10 in the world by US publication Paybefore in 2015 being the only European in the list. As a lawyer he has worked closely with The Payments Services Regulator, HM Treasury, UK Finance and Financial Conduct Association, in the UK as well as other compliance and industry bodies globally. Robert has deep expertise in electronic money and payment services and is highly skilled in all aspects of payment services including consumer protection, banking regulation and compliance, and AML/CTF. Robert is highly active on the conference front regularly chairing and moderating events as well as speaking on issues facing the European Payments’ Industry including laws relating to blockchain, digital assets and Central Bank Digital Currencies.
Cedric Ming, MLaw, CAMS
Senior Associate, Compliance, RegTech, & Managed Legal Services at PwC Switzerland
Cedric Ming is an experienced banking professional. Skilled in Legal Project Management, Regulation, IT, Sales, Payments, Financial Markets, Blockchain, Auditing, Risk Management, Compliance, AI and Cloud.
Currently he is a Senior Associate in the Compliance, RegTech and Managed Legal Services team at PricewaterhouseCoopers Ltd. (“PwC”) in Zürich, Switzerland. He is an experienced consultant in the financial services and non-financial services sector. His main areas of focus are Financial Crime Compliance, Digital Assets, NFTs, the Metaverse, AI, and Data Privacy. Within PwC, he has also worked as a Regulatory Auditor in Switzerland and Liechtenstein. He is a co-founder and the Vice President of MetaverseTalks Association. He is a Web3 SME for the Times Professional Learning, a division of Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd in India.
Prior to working at PwC he helped grow one of the first Swiss FinTech’s in the area of Payments, which today has over 4 million customers in Switzerland. He has also worked in the areas of Real Estate Investment, and as a Start-Up Entrepreneur and Coach.
Cedric holds a Master of Law degree from the University of Zurich in Business and Financial Law, a Bachelor’s degree in Swiss Law, and he did a Bachelors Program in International Management and Economics.
Jessica Ramos
Head of Regulatory and Financial Affairs at EBA Clearing
Jessica Ramos is the Head of Regulatory, Oversight and Financial Affairs at EBA CLEARING.
Prior, she held a number of positions at SWIFT, namely in Oversight Affairs, Legal & Compliance, Finance and as Chief of Staff to the global CEO. She was also responsible for diversity and inclusion initiatives for the business. She started her career in 2006 as an Associate in Consortium Central America, focusing on banking, finance and corporate law. She is a member of the Belgian Company Lawyers Bar, the New York Bar, the Honduran Bar and the In-house Competition Lawyers Association.
In addition to her Law Degree, Jessica holds an MBA in Finance, an LL.M. in Corporate Law from New York University (NYU) and an LL.M. in Competition Law and Economics from the Brussels School of Competition. She has recently been certified in Governance, Risk and Compliance (GRC), Cyber Security for Business Leaders and Social Media Marketing and Law, Cognitive Technologies & Artificial Intelligence.
Jessica is an Executive Board Member and Belgium Ambassador of European Women Payments Network (EWPN), Board Advisor to CyberWayFinder and The Nine, and a ConceptionX Expert. She founded Mizbiz in 2016, an organisation aiming to connect, inspire and empower women in Belgium.
Jessica is a frequent speaker at financial industry events on topics ranging from Payments, Technology, RegTech, Compliance, Financial Crime, Cyber Security, Diversity and Inclusion and ESG.
Freddie Frith
Head of Financial Services at Clausematch
Freddie Frith joined Clausematch in 2018, where he has quickly progressed in different commercial roles. He now heads up Clausematch’s commercial proposition for Financial Services, focusing on accelerating the adoption across NeoBanking, FinTech, Insurance and Investment Management. Before working at Clausematch, Freddie worked in commercial roles as Silverfin, Ogilvy and Loreal. Freddie is also a thought leader in Regulatory Technology, regularly hosting podcasts and webinars, contributing to whitepapers and writing blog posts.
Vasileios Papoutsis
Head of Compliance & MLRO at Binance Cyprus
Vasileios Papoutsis is the Head of Compliance and Money Laundering Reporting Officer at Binance Cyprus. He is a holder of the professional certifications of Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE), Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist (CAMS) and CySEC-issued certification of AML Compliance Officer (AMLCO). He has extensive experience in heavily regulated industries such as Banking and Crypto/Virtual Assets Service Providers ecosystem and he is a specialist in the areas of Regulatory Reporting, AML and Forensic investigations.
Michael Diamantoulis
Chief Compliance Officer at epay a Euronet Worldwide Group Company
Holder of supervised and/or c-suite positions (CCO, CRO, MLRO), Michael has worked throughout the banking as well as the payments sector, by starting-up and running control functions, organizing 2nd lines of defence and setting-up strategies and policies, mainly Risk, AML and Compliance related. Michael has supported the obtaining of payment institute and e-money licensing, the receiving of card association principal memberships and the completion of funding (investment) rounds. He represented the e-money sector through-out Greece's latest National Risk Assessment. Michael believes in risk mitigation through a balanced, proactive, and transparent approach and enjoys infusing positivity and trust into workplaces.
David Bundi
Chairman at MetaverseTalks Association
David Bundi is the Metaverse Strategy & Regulatory Leader and Head of Compliance at PwC Switzerland, Legal. Before joining PwC, he held a position as Chief Compliance Officer at an innovative Swiss bank following various senior roles as Legal & Compliance expert at banks in Zurich and New York. David is also the Chairman of the Swiss non-profit association MetaverseTalks which serves as a leading space where Metaverse & NFT thought leaders and interested people connect, foster and promote ideas globally. He has studied Swiss, EU, UK and US law, likes gaming and technology, and is a guest lecturer at universities respectively business schools in Zurich, Lausanne, Miami and Guatemala.
Gregorios Siourounis
Founder at EveryPay
Gregorios Siouounis is the Co-Founder and Chairman of EveryPay. An online payment gateway for Businesses, EveryPay is one of the most advanced paytechs in Europe.
He is a serial entrepreneur, has extensive experience in financial engineering, algorithmic trading and global payments and has served in several C-Level positions and Boards in the last 25 years.
Gregorios is also an Assistant Professor in Economics at the Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences. He holds a PhD from London Business School, an MSc from Iowa State University and Universitat Pompeu Fabra and has a BS from Athens University of Economics and Business.
Andrew Doukanaris
Chief Executive Officer at Flotta Consulting Ltd
Andrew has been at the heart of the digital payments transformation for almost three decades, holding senior roles in issuing and acquiring with Chevron/Texaco, Visa Inc., JCB Cards, and a Mastercard advisor in The Middle East - During which time has been based in Singapore, San Francisco, New York and London.
He is a Fintech mentor/board advisor at Level39 in London and the former CEO and Chairman of multinational QR code payments Pomelo Pay. In January 2022, Andrew was appointed CEO of Blukite Network - an Open Banking network with revolutionary patented technology.
Panagiotis Kriaris
Commercial Director - Business Development at Unzer
Panagiotis has spent his career in the borderline between business and technology with a leadership background at an international level. Panagiotis brings senior expertise across Financial Services, Banking, Payments, FinTech and E-Commerce.
Innovation, Digitization, Emerging Technologies, Strategy & Business Development have been at the center of his work and attention over the last years.
Chris Aruliah
Chief Commercial Officer at BCB Group
Chris is an industry veteran, passionate about financial innovation, and was previously at Bitstamp, where he held the role of Head of Business Development and was responsible for helping financial institutions enter the crypto market and focused on identifying opportunities for integrating crypto with traditional finance. Prior to that, he launched the open banking payments platform, Token, and built the pipeline for the business in Europe.
Dr. Charis Savvides
Lawyer & Law Lecturer at Institute For the Future - UNIC
Dr Charis Savvides is a practising lawyer, Partner at Stelios Americanos & Co LLC, one of the largest, full service, law firms in Cyprus. He is also lecturer at the University of Nicosia, where he has been a faculty member of the Law School for a number of years and of the Department of Digital Innovation of the Business School since 2020. He is the leading instructor of all regulatory courses in the Master’s programme of the University in Blockchain and Digital Currency, which is the world’s first Master’s degree in Blockchain and one of the top academic programs in the field. The practice areas of Dr Savvides include, amongst others, the regulatory framework of digital services and digital markets, especially in the areas of corporate, investment and financial law. He is legal advisor to investment funds, investment firms and crypto-asset services providers. Furthermore, he is an expert panel member of the European Union Blockchain Observatory & Forum, a member of the Cyprus Investment Funds Association (CIFA) and a member of the Technology Committee of the Cyprus Bar Association. He is regular speaker at professional seminars, workshops and conferences, including special courses for law enforcement agencies, where he shares his knowledge and experience about the regulatory status and trends in the fields of investment funds and digital currencies.
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Stelios Georgakis
Director, Central Bank of Cyprus
Stelios joined the Central Bank of Cyprus (CBC) in 1992, after qualifying as a Chartered Accountant with Coopers & Lybrand (now PwC) in the UK. In January 2013 he became the Head of the Licensing and Regulatory Compliance Section of the Supervision Division. As such, he negotiated the AML action plan with the Troika relating to the banking sector, and oversaw its successful implementation. With the introduction of the Single Supervisory Mechanism (SSM) of the European Central Bank, he became responsible for the On-Site Inspections, the AML/CFT supervision and the prudential supervision of credit, payment and e-money institutions that fall outside the scope of the SSM. In March 2017 he became Head of the supervision of significant and less significant credit institutions. He was the CBC member of the EBA Board of Supervisors and alternate member of the Supervisory Board of the SSM. As of 1 November 2020, he is Head of the Financial Market Infrastructures & Payments Department and of the Accounting Services & Controlling Department.
Stelios also holds a B.Sc.(Hons) in Civil Engineering and an MBA.
Elina Mattila
Executive Director at Mobey Forum
Elina has been part of the Mobey Forum team since 2012, managing relationships with key decision-makers at major banks, solution, providers and Mobey Forum's partner organisation, and is always looking for new ways to bring more value to Mobey Forum's members. Before joining Mobey Elina worked as a journalist in London, at Informa, Telecoms and Media, and Mobile Magazine, covering the digital disruption in the media and mobile content industry. She holds an MSc in Political Economy of Development from SOAS University of London.
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Vishal Shah
Director - Applications System Development Digital Modernization Engineering, Global Payments at Tsys
Vishalanand holds 22+ years of experience in the payments and transactions industry. He has niche knowledge in the banking industry, payment schemes, digital innovations, and the data modeling arena. He holds deep experience in the management of large-scale IT projects, service managements methodologies, and people management skills. Banks and customers across Europe, LATAM, ISEA, MEA, and CIS have received his expert services. Vishalanand is a vegetarian foodie and loves tracking, gardening.
Nikolett Palinkas
Head of Operations at payabl.
Nikolett is the Head of Operations at payabl. With valuable experience in the payments and financial services industries, she is passionate about leveraging innovative technologies to optimise operations for online merchants.
In her previous roles, Nikolett gained significant skills in both a client relations and sales capacity, equipping her with a well-rounded view of the challenges and opportunities that clients may encounter.
Currently, her responsibilities include designing efficient policies, overseeing merchant onboarding processes, leading account management and customer service, and implementing alternative payment solutions.
Georgios Galanis
Director Compliance/MLRO at EVO Payments Greece
Georgios shares his 20+ yrs of experience among Control Functions of Compliance, Risk, Audit and Privacy within Banking, Issuing and Acquiring services.
Currently he holds a Management position as a Director Governance, Risk and Compliance/MLRO and Data Privacy Officer in the PI of one of the biggest Issuing and Acquiring Group of Companies in Europe, facing a multi-challenged regulatory framework which has to accommodate local and international banking and payments regulatory framework and regulations, International Standards, Quality Assurance Standards (ISOs) and Payment Card Industry Standards
Georgios holds a MSc in Banking and a BSc in Economics and is certified as CCO, DPO, BCI (Business Continuity Expert) and ISO9001 Lead Auditor.
Giorgos Konstantinou
Member of the Advisory Board at Indentomat
Giorgos Konstantinou has over 14 years of cumulative experience at senior management roles in the Financial Services sector, covering in particular risk advisory, financial crime (AML, CFT, fraud, sanctions, antibribery and corruption), regulatory compliance, internal audit and AML risk assessments.
He is currently the Group AML Director at an advisory firm, covering financial institutions and corporates. He also serves as a member of the Advisory Board for a well know digital KYC software system.
Prior to his current role, he was a Senior Manager in the Regulatory Risk Advisory team at Deloitte Cyprus, specializing in Regulatory Compliance and AML related matters, whilst he has also served as the Money Laundering Compliance Officer (MLCO) for Deloitte Investment Services (DIS). As an advisor, he has worked with various financial institutions internationally to provide tailor-made solutions for responding to financial crime incidents remediating past deficiencies from regulatory inspections, enhancing and automating client onboarding models and optimizing transaction monitoring systems. Prior to Deloitte, Giorgos has spent three years at PwC Cyprus, where he was leading the Central Compliance Services team. Before PWC, Giorgos spent more than six years with Barclays Bank as a Relationship Manager.
Sotiris Syrmakezis
Co-Founder & CEO at Throo
Sotiris Syrmakezis is one of the most well-known executives in the Greek market in the areas of fintech and digital transformation. He has co-founded and is the CEO of Throo Payments Europe, a fintech to be licensed in Lithuania with the technology being developed in Greece. Throo is a technology platform for digital payments, loyalty and marketing for individuals and businesses.
Sotiris is also a board member of Finclude, an Irish fintech providing open banking-based credit appraisals. Very recently he advised large enterprises on digital transformation strategy and implementation.
Until the end of 2018 Sotiris was the Chief Retail, Digital & Technology Officer of Praxia Bank, later acquired by Viva Wallet. From mid-2015 until early 2018 he worked for Eurobank, as General Manager, Member of the Executive Committee and Group Chief Digital & Technology Officer. From early 2000 and for more than 15 years, he served in Piraeus Bank Group, the last three of which he was General Manager and Head of Retail Banking and e-Business. He is known as the person behind the success of the digital banking platform ‘winbank.’ He started his career late 1990 in Egnatia Bank where he was the Chief Information Officer from 1996 until 2000 and where he launched the first internet banking service in Greece.
Sotiris has served as a board member in numerous listed and private companies in the areas of banking, insurance, investments and retail in Greece and abroad.
He holds a Master’s degree in Technology & Innovation Management from Technical University of Crete (Chania) and a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from University of Crete (Heraklion).
Andreas Vlachos
Head of Community and Growth (Marketing) at Binance
Andreas Vlachos has been a professional in the field of Blockchain since 2014. He is the Binance Growth Manager in Greece and Cyprus. Previously he has worked for 4 years at the University of Nicosia, focusing on construction of academic material and collaborations with various bodies within the crypto ecosystem. Since 2019 he has worked as a Business Development Director at crypto startups such as ODEM.io and TrustSwap.
Anastasis Rossides
Head of Risk Modelling at Bank of Cyprus
Anastasis is the Head of Risk Modelling at Bank of Cyprus. Before joining BoC, he worked as post-doctoral researcher for European project BRIDGES, developing path-planning optimization software for autonomous underwater gliders. Passionate about solving business problems through data-driven approaches, ranging from descriptive analytics to practical application of ML/AI models.
Yiannos Ashiotis
Partner - Regulatory Compliance & Fund Services at Grant Thornton
Yiannos is leading the regulatory compliance and fund services department at Grant Thornton (Cyprus) Ltd and he is the managing director of its subsidiary company Grant Thornton Fund Services (Cyprus) Ltd. He has extensive knowledge of regulatory requirements for financial and credit institutions and substantial sectoral experience both in the Middle East and the EU.
He has advised clients on governance, risk, and compliance regulatory framework and requirements and assisted regulators, financial groups and large corporates in various aspects of GRC program implementation. Additionally, he is actively involved in authorization, compliance and risk management engagements for investment firms, banks, payment institutions, investment funds, and crypto asset service providers.
Yiannos is a Certified Public Accountant (AICPA) and holds an MBA in International Finance and a BSc in Business Administration (Accounting and Finance). He is a Board Member of the Chartered Institute for Securities and Investment (CISI) Cyprus National Advisory Council and holds the follow professional qualifications:
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Certified Financial Services Auditor (Institute of Internal Auditors – IIA)
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Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist (Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialists – ACAMS)
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Certificate in Global Financial Compliance (Chartered Institute for Securities and Investment – CISI)
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Advanced Certificate in Financial Services (Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission – CySEC
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Panos Kyriakides
Senior Commercial Manager at eBOS
Panos Kyriakides is a business professional with more than twenty years of experience in the Financial and Banking sector. Throughout the course of his career, he has gained valuable insights in communicating with people at all levels, by building and maintaining sound business relationship with customers and stakeholders. His extensive experience in compliance and due diligence of clients, enables him to analyse and understand clients’ needs and promote business products and services to potential clients while strictly streamlining processes in line with regulations and thus ensuring compliance to enforced practices and policies. Panos is currently the Commercial Manager of eBOS.
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Niresh Rajah
Managing Director, Head of Data, RegTech & Digital Advisory Practice, Financial Services Group at Grant Thornton UK LLP
Niresh is an executive leader in Financial Services and Consulting with 20 years of experience focused on Data, Digital, Regulation, Automation, Innovation and Transformation. Niresh is Managing Director at Grant Thornton and leads the Data, RegTech & Digital Assurance practice at Grant Thornton.
He is also a Board Advisor and Non-Executive Director for FinTech’s and Reg-Techs.
Previous to joining Grant Thornton, Niresh spent 10 years at Barclays and Lloyds Bank. He has led a number of capabilities as Deputy Chief Data Officer covering Regulatory Change Developments, Regulatory Change Execution, Chief Data Office (Data Management & Governance), Data Driven Solutions (data analytics, and data science), Automation of Controls and the Reg-Tech capability (Innovation Hub).
He has led major complex regulatory and data programmes at Board level including Brexit changes and GDPR. He also has extensive experience working with regulators across Europe on complex topics such as Data Management, Data Privacy & Data protection, Conduct and Prudential regulation and compliance with Brexit and GDPR.
Niresh has an MBA from the University of Oxford. He is an advisory board member of a number of FinTech & Reg-Tech judging panels evaluating scale-up and start-up companies.
Niresh works with exciting fintech and regtech start-up and scale-ups. He is a resident expert for data and regulation at Oxford Foundry (Oxford University’s Accelerator), a mentor at Seedcamp (one of Europe’s largest seed funds) and a mentor for data, digital and automation at FinTech Alliance (a digital platform for fintechs).
He is also a co-chair of the UK chief data officer governing body for Evanta, a Gartner company, and an advisory board member at the A-Team group for both regtech and data.
His past experience spans Oil & Gas, Mining, FMCG, Central Government working at Deloitte and Ernst & Young with client projects including BP, Shell, De Beers, Allied Irish Bank, London Olympics , Saudi Aramaco, Unilever and Marks & Spencer’s. He has extensive experience working across Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
Michael Clark
Vice President, Global Product and Technology Lead for Platforms, Ventures and Partnerships at Mastercard
Michael is an execution-focused data strategist and futurist specializing in converging current and future technologies into cutting-edge propositions, and experiences. Data and payments have been at the heart of his career, from data strategies to full automation, AI-driven experiences, and the future of payments. Michael has helped globally established firms and well-known fintechs realize their future digital visions. In his current role at Mastercard, he is helping clients, reimagine how data and future payment trends will evolve their businesses. Using platforms of the future and strategies to inform and design possible futures, spanning, data monetization, future value Exchanges across augmented worlds, new forms of payment, and Bank as a Service to the Metaverse and beyond. Michael is also a member of GAIA-X and the Berlin Group, where he helps shape the future of data and Open Banking API’s for Europe.
Justine Scerri Herrera
Partner at MK Fintech Partners Ltd
Dr.Justine Scerri Herrera is a Managing Partner at MK Fintech Partners which Maltese entity forms part of the Top Tier International ‘Michael Kyprianou’ group. Incidentally, MK is Top ranked in The Legal 500 and according to Gold Magazine is the 3rd Largest in size in Cyprus. Her areas of expertise include Fintech, Blockchain, Crypto and investments sectors. Justine mainly deals in advising and licencing for issuers and service providers falling under the Maltese Virtual Financial Assets Regulations (crypto & blockchain), Investment Services Act (Capital Market players, Capital Raising etc) and Financial Institutions Act (EMI, PI). Justine’s love for fintech and decentralisation sprouted 7 years ago while conducting her Doctoral and Masters Thesis’s focusing on jurisdiction in cyberspace and the rise of technology. Justine’s past work experience includes working for a Top Tier Investments Firm (Exante), an International Bank and a leading criminal law firm. Other academic accomplishes include a certification with the Malta Stock Exchange in ‘Securities and Trading’ and certification in ‘Virtual Financial Assets’. Notably, Justine formed part of Malta’s Digital Think Thank (Taskforce set up by the Maltese Government) and was recently nominated to be on the VFA Executive Committee which is part of the Malta Chamber of Commerce. Justine is also a true academic at heart and in her spare times often publishes research and speaks at events worldwide. Her favourite quote is ‘knowledge is power’.
