OUR SPEAKERS
Alex Dunn
Director - Innovation & Strategic Growth Initiatives at Visa
Alex Dunn is Director for Innovation & Strategic Growth Initiatives at Visa. He is part of the Visa Direct money movement business where he is leading global strategic growth projects to build the future of money and payments inc. several cross-industry collaboration with central banks and Visa’s clients. He previously worked in Visa's Product & Payment Services Risk team, leading strategic risk initiatives to drive growth, enhance Visa's operational resilience and protect the payments ecosystem.
Before Visa, Alex worked for 7.5 years at the Bank of England across Risk, Supervision and Parliamentary Affairs. Inc. a secondment from the Bank as Head of Risk at the UK Office for National Statistics. Alex’s research interests include the role of payments and settlement systems, emerging digital finance, and the evolution of central bank balance sheets.
Alex is a Chartered Manager and has an Executive MBA from the University of Exeter Business School, an MSc from the London School of Economics and a BA from the University of Hull. Alex has Diploma and Associate qualifications in Guitar from the London College of Music.
Donatien Chedom Fotso
Director of Artificial Intelligence at EPAM Systems
Donatien Chedom Fotso is a Data Science and AI leader with over 18 years of experience spanning both academia and industry. He specialises in building and leading high-performing AI/data teams, driving the implementation and adoption of state-of-the-art AI/ML technologies to deliver impactful, end-to-end solutions across various industries.
Donatien holds a Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics and a degree in Computer Science. His academic work includes contributions at the University of Oxford, where he applied AI and machine learning techniques to cancer research, enhancing understanding of disease evolution, personalised therapies, and early diagnostics. He previously led the Applied AI team at Deutsche Bank's Data Science CoE, overseeing the development and deployment of enterprise-wide AI solutions across multiple business units.
Currently, Donatien serves as Director of Artificial Intelligence at EPAM Systems, where he leads initiatives to deliver enterprise-grade AI solutions across a broad range of industries, with particular focus on the BFSI sector within their AI consulting unit. He supports clients at various stages of their AI adoption journey, helping them leverage AI to unlock business value, enhance competitiveness, and drive sustainable growth.
Donatien is passionate about translating innovative AI research into tangible business outcomes, consistently applying cutting-edge technologies to solve complex real-world challenges.
Susana Esteban
Managing Director Blockchain & Digital Assets at FTI Consulting
Susana Esteban is a leading economist and digital assets expert advising corporates, financial institutions, and fintechs on the integration of blockchain, tokenized money, and digital financial infrastructure. She leads the Digital Assets & Blockchain practice at FTI Consulting in EMEA, where she specialises in tokenisation strategies, stablecoin adoption, and the valuation of digital assets and platforms. Susana also serves on the expert panel of the Digital Euro Association, helping shape inclusive and compliant models for the future of money and finance.
Kene Ezeji-Okoye
Chief Blockchain Officer at Ubyx
Strategist and technologist bridging traditional finance and public blockchains, leading engagements with and advising with some of the world’s largest public and private financial institutions to advance real-world adoption of high-impact digital asset innovations.
Gaurav Sharma
Head of UK Payments at PagoNxt Payments
Gaurav Sharma is a results-oriented payments leader passionate about fostering payments innovation, strategic transformation, and exceptional customer experiences.
He is committed to operational efficiency, robust risk management, and creating high-performing teams.
Gaurav has considerable experience in ISO 20022, UK Payment Schemes, SWIFT Service Bureaus, Critical National Infrastructure upgrades and Cross Border Payments.
Louise Beaumont
Independant Expert
Dr Louise Beaumont is an independent expert in open banking, finance and data and key supporting technologies such as digital identity. Over the last 15 years, she has focussed on developing the market, working with legislators; regulators; standards, scheme and industry bodies to create disruption; with corporates to cope with disruption; and with start-ups to exploit disruption – with open and accessible data as the guiding principle.
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Suresh Vaghjiani
CEO at CLOWD9
Suresh is CEO and founder of B-Corp certified CLOWD9, the world’s first cloud-native, decentralized issuer processing platform. Born in the cloud, the platform delivers uncompromising, limitless payments technology around the globe.
Suresh is a highly experienced senior executive with a proven track record of leading rapid-growth companies. He has expertise in developing products and services on behalf of both, financial technology, as well as FCA regulated companies.
Bringing a wealth of knowledge in global payments with a number of prior senior roles including CEO of Tribe Payments, President & Managing Director of Threadd, as well as listed companies such as Paysafe Group and PXP Financial, Suresh has represented the Fintech sector and the UK Government on a number of trade missions to Mexico, Australia, and China.
Nithya Sridharan
Director, Digital Assets at TPICAP
As Product Director for Digital Assets at TP ICAP, Nithya Sridharan lead strategic initiatives at the intersection of traditional finance and Digital assets, helping institutions navigate this evolving landscape. Her experience spans investment banking, strategic investments, markets, risk management, regulatory affairs, IT, and public policy research across the UK and Asia.
An alum of Credit Suisse’s Executive Board–sponsored Leadership Acceleration Program, she brings a leadership style rooted in inclusion and a passion for building scalable, responsible financial innovation.
Outside of work, she writes on the interplay between 'Culture and Capital', where she explores how culture shapes our economic thinking.
Jeremy McDougall
Strategic Solution Consulting Director at ACI Worldwide
As a Strategic Solution Consulting Director at ACI Worldwide, Jeremy has committed his career to advancing his vision of providing the vast majority of people with access to safe, affordable and transparent payments. As a respected thought leader, Jeremy has authored papers and blogs on the importance of industry collaboration and regularly speaks at Payments events to try and find people who will continue to help create a resilient and inclusive payments ecosystem.
Sarah Ghosh
FCMA, CGMA, Senior Finance Professional at UK Civil Service
Sarah Ghosh is highly respected in the finance and accounting profession globally. Her influence and thought leadership continue to be recognised; she was named as one of the Top 50 Women in Accounting (2023), and Accounting Personality of the Year (2024). Sarah has 20+ years of experience working with finance functions to improve productivity and effectiveness through digital transformation and frontier technologies.
Sarah was appointed President of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA) and co-chair of the Association of International Certified Professional Accountants (AICPA) in 2023, representing the largest and most influential body of professional accountants globally.
Sarah is currently working in the UK Civil Service, leading Finance teams and supporting the UK Government’s Finance Function Strategy with a focus on driving technology adoption and sustainability. Sarah is a trusted advisor and participates in cross-Government initiatives to influence policy in areas such as Quantum technologies, sustainability and regulatory compliance.
Zeina Arnous
Founder & Managing Director at ZExcella
Zeina is a seasoned Governance, Risk, and Compliance (GRC) expert with over two decades of experience in financial services, risk management, internal audit, and regulatory compliance across the GCC, UK, and EU markets. She is the founder of Zexcella, a UK-based GRC advisory firm delivering cross-border regulatory and compliance solutions across the UK and the wider Middle East.
With a forward-thinking approach, Zeina is also a passionate advocate for the responsible and practical integration of Artificial Intelligence into compliance and risk functions. Her work bridges traditional regulatory frameworks with emerging technologies, helping businesses navigate complexity while upholding integrity and trust.
Having worked with regulators, financial institutions, and corporate clients, Zeina brings a global perspective rooted in regional insight—especially in high-growth and tightly regulated markets. She regularly advises on market entry strategies, risk-based governance models, and compliance operating structures for both start-ups and established firms.
Now based in London, Zeina combines entrepreneurial leadership with community values. She is actively fostering dialogue among regulators, legal experts, technologists, and business leaders to shape the future of ethical and effective compliance.
Richard Wham
VP of EMEA at Airia
Rich Wham has spent the last 20 years helping to build and scale various enterprise software vendors and solution resellers across the UK and EMEA markets, pan-industry. Notable experiences include BMC, MongoDB and Lacework. Combining start-up and scale-up expertise, most recently in the data and analytics space, ensure Rich is well equipped to help Airia establish a market-leading presence in Europe that focuses on customer outcomes and partner success.
Philipp Kleine Jäger
Senior Partner at CORE
Dr Philipp Kleine Jäger is a senior partner at CORE, EPAM's strategy consulting firm. His areas of expertise include technology-driven strategies, transformations and restructuring with a focus on sustainability. He is particularly interested in core banking, platform business models and beyond banking for the integration of other industries. He is responsible for promoting growth across the EMEA region.
Kamran Hedjri
Group CEO at PXP
The end-to-end payment platform: PXP Financial provides a single unified payments platform to accept payments online, on mobile and at the point of sale. Powered by inhouse acquiring, 200+ alternative payment methods & financial services, PXP processes over EUR 21.5 billion annually through our unified gateway. Whatever your business needs today or tomorrow, PXP Financials’ innovative payment platform will support your business growth with all the payment services you will ever need from one source, wherever your business takes you.
Stephanos Papadopoulos
Founder & CEO at Spatzia.eu
Stephanos is an International Trusted Advisor, Accredited Coach and Consultant to Founders Entrepreneurs, Business Owners and C-Level Executives. He is also a Board Member, Public Speaker and Podcast Creator & Host. He has first-hand experience in C-Level roles in countries across the globe in high pressure, fast paced, international board rooms and can relate to the opportunities and threats that these environments create for the leaders involved.
Stephanos creates space for his clients, which allows them to fine-tune and increase their creativity, focus and resolve, for what matters to them most. His work with his clients enables their growth and supports them in making bigger, better and more confident decisions on a professional and personal basis.
He has worked in C Suite, Advisory Board and Board of Directors Level positions in strategy, finance and operations, as well as a consultant and coach in numerous industries (financial services, FMCG, retail trade, manufacturing, high tech, education, mining, construction, heavy machinery trading, automobile trade) on an international basis, in companies from start up to mature phase, backed primarily by Family Office, Private Equity and VC funding.
Sulabh Agarwal
Global Payments Lead at Accenture
As our global lead for Payments, Sulabh helps financial institutions and other organizations across the world navigate the shifting payments landscape, combat lost payments revenue, and control and mitigate operational risk throughout the payments value chain. Throughout his career, Sulabh has directed numerous client engagements ranging from defining strategy through to systems integration and implementation. Prior to Accenture, Sulabh worked for Capital One in the cards business. Outside of work, Sulabh likes to spend time with his wife and three kids. He is an engineer from the Indian Institute of Technology and has an MBA from INSEAD.
Willem Wellinghoff
UK Chair & Chief Compliance Officer at Ecommpay
Having joined Ecommpay in 2023, Willem is the Chief Compliance Officer for Ecommpay, and executive director responsible for the compliance, legal and risk strategy of the business.
He is also the founder of Finseco, a boutique advisory service for startups and growth-stage companies in the FinTech and RegTech space. Prior to Ecommpay, Willem was one of the co-founding members of Shieldpay, VP Compliance for LendInvest, and Group Head of Legal and Regulatory Affairs for Cabot Credit Management.
Willem has also been a special advisor to the Board of the Credit Services Association (CSA) in connection with consumer credit and debt collection regulation representing the trade association in driving change and working with regulators like the FCA, ICO, OFCOM and the Law Commission.
Danas Oliškevičius
Sales Executive at Payall Payment Systems
Danas started his professional career in finance at AB Banks Snoras in 2010 where he lead the Vilnius regional commercial unit team with responsibilities selling bank products like bank accounts, payments cards, POS terminals. From 2013 to 2019 he founded and was CEO of Finolita, which in 2019 was granted an eMI license from the Bank of Lithuania and services FTSE100 companies. In 2021 Danas returned to actively participating in E-finance consulting activities covering business development, AML/CTF, compliance, crisis management and fundraising. In 2023 Danas joined Payall - the pioneer in purpose-built banking infrastructure, transforming the entire cross-border payments ecosystem.
Knox Mcilwain
Global Lead Regulatory, Compliance & Licensing Strategy at AIRWALLEX
Knox leads the regulatory, compliance and licensing functions for Airwallex to support its continued expansion to serve new markets. Prior to Airwallex, he was a partner at Allen & Overy and worked in both London and New York at Cleary Gottlieb advising major banking institutions, FMIs, asset managers and G20 governments on financial services and regulatory matters. He started his career as a coder, network architect and entrepreneur.
Emma Joyce
Chief Revenue Officer at Global Blockchain Business Council (GBBC)
Emma is the Senior Managing Director and Head of EMEA at the Global Blockchain Business Council (GBBC), the largest industry association for the blockchain technology and digital assets community. She has over 15 years of experience in the financial services sector, working with regulators, policymakers, members, and partners to advocate and accelerate the adoption of best practices for digital assets. At GBBC, Emma leads the financial services-related activities and oversees the strategic direction and growth of the association in the EMEA region. She also serves as a board director for GBBC USA and GBBC Giving. Previously, she was the Chief Executive Officer of GBBC Digital Finance (GDF). Emma is a recognized thought leader and speaker on policy and regulatory issues related to blockchain and digital assets, and was named one of the top 20 most influential women in crypto by Financial News in 2023.
Sabine Dittrich
Head of EU Financial Regulation at Slaughter and May
Sabine is a trusted advisor to Executive Boards on Strategic Regulatory & Legal Risks & Opportunities with a deep understanding of Business needs across the Financial Sector.
For her profession, Sabine is well connected with Regulators & Policymakers in Europe, International Organisations and beyond. Sabine has held numerous board or chair positions in industry associations, namely in Europe at EFAMA, AFME and ICMA. She is also a regular guest of roundtables and discussions on innovative thought leadership topics, such as sustainability, diversity and digitisation/Crypto. Currently in career transition, she has held most recently a global responsibility for Regulatory Intelligence at UBS Asset Management. Prior to this, Sabine held other positions at UBS Group and Wealth Management including Group Head EU Public Policy, where she was responsible for setting up the Swiss Finance Council in Brussels as a joint venture association with Credit Suisse, amongst other responsibilities. Sabine worked for many years at Magic Circles law firm, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer in Frankfurt and started her career at German law firm Hengeler Mueller and the ECB.
Sabine is author of several publications, holds a PhD in International Securities Law and an MBA of HEC Paris (exchange to SDA Bocconi, Milan).
Rich Wagner
CEO at Zempler Bank
Rich Wagner is CEO and founder of Cashplus Bank, a leading UK fintech challenger, and has over 30 years of experience in payments and banking, including executive roles at Visa, Barclaycard and Providian.
Cashplus was authorised as a UK bank in February 2021 building on its history of fintech and lending innovation and was awarded a BCR Capability and Innovation Fund grant in September 2021 in order to build out its range of smart, simple SME banking and lending products.
Outside of his work at Cashplus, Rich has been an active and vocal industry advocate, is currently a member of the UK Finance Payments Board and earlier played a key role in gaining fair access to UK payments systems for non-banks.
Manish Kumar
Head of Payment Acceptance at Starling Bank
Fintech leader with 20+ years of experience in building & scaling B2B/B2C products innovations (0-10, 10-100, 100-1000), managing global cross-functional teams, related product revenue/P&Ls and delivering complex transformation globally across UK, Europe, North America and Asia-Pacific.
Jun Cai
Country Head for UK, Germany, Switzerland, Central and Eastern Europe at Alipay+
Jun is based in Munich and has worked for Alipay+ for over seven years. Currently he holds the position of Country Head for key markets across the UK and Europe, driving its growth with local retailers, acquirers and mobile payment partners to support Ant International’s European expansion.
Last year Jun led Ant International and Alipay+’s payment sponsorship of UEFA EURO 2024, which spearheaded a national campaign across Germany to raise brand awareness and support more merchants to accept the Alipay+ mobile payment solution, enabling them to better serve inbound sports tourists.
Prior to this, Jun was Head of Product and Technology for Alipay+ across the EMEA region, where he specialised in topics including payment systems, payment network, blockchain, open banking, banking as a service, and Open API.
Prior to his role at Alipay+, John held positions with Fiducia & GAD IT AG and it-economics GmbH.
Roman Zilber
Founder at Intrepid Fox
Roman Zilber is an international banker with over 30 years of experience at leading US and European banks, including Bank of America, Crédit Agricole, and Raiffeisen. Two years ago, he founded Intrepid Fox—an AI-powered SaaS platform focused on KYB. With deep knowledge of financial operations and where automation often fails, Roman set out to solve a key problem in digital transformation: the messy mix of manual and automated processes. He brings both strategic insight and practical experience to improving compliance and onboarding.
Jürg Baltensperger
Managing Director at JayBee Ltd
Jürg Baltensperger is one of the most experienced and well-known pioneers in the field of regulation & compliance for financial intermediaries in FinTech and Blockchain. As a graduated lawyer, risk manager & business economist and certified Blockchain expert, he covers regulatory aspects in his field of expertise in a holistic approach.
With the consulting firm JayBee he founded in 2017, Jürg and his team support around 120+ financial intermediaries in the areas of fintech & blockchain such as banks, asset managers and crypto exchanges. JayBee serves clients from startup level to international collaborations with regulatory consulting, licensing and outsourcing services. JayBee also provides staff lending & recruiting services and partners with various IT tool provider in order to offer implementation of RegTech solutions.
Jürg teaches in the areas of Corporate Governance, Risk Management & Compliance at universities of applied sciences and set up his own education CAS Digital Compliance Officer at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences, where compliance officers, auditors & regulators are made fit in the areas of FinTech & Crypto.
Andrew Doukanaris
Chief Executive Officer at Flotta Consulting Ltd
Andrew has been a driving force in the digital payments and FinTech transformation for over three decades. Throughout his global career, he has held senior and executive roles in Singapore, San Francisco, New York, and London.
At Chevron, Texaco, and Caltex, Andrew established and led the global marketing and sales, payments and retailing division across three brands. At Visa, he served as the European and CEMEA head of Merchant Acceptance, Acquiring Services, and Commercial Cards, overseeing operations in more than 120 markets. As Senior Vice President at JCB Cards Europe, he spearheaded the transformation of its acquiring, sales, and marketing divisions. Additionally, he worked as a consultant for Mastercard in Saudi Arabia.
Andrew founded Flotta Consulting Ltd to provide tailored consulting services to start-ups, scale-ups, and established players within the payments ecosystem. He has been appointed to various leadership roles, including Chair, Director, and CEO of Pomelo Pay, Intellias, and as an advisor and CEO for start-ups focused on open banking and QR code payments.
A sought-after commentator and podcaster, Andrew also serves as a FinTech mentor and advisor at Level39, an ambassador and moderator at the UK Payments Association, and a board advisor, event chairman, and moderator at QUBE Events.
Peter-Jan Grech
Founder and CEO at BRND WGN
Peter-Jan Grech, founder and CEO of BRND WGN, is a renowned figure in the realm of brand transformations, boasting over two decades of expertise. His leadership at BRND WGN, a top-tier brand advisory agency with a presence in Malta and the UK, has been instrumental in navigating businesses and leaders through impactful change strategies and brand expansion in multiple sectors, including financial services and hospitality. As a skilled public speaker, Peter-Jan hosts the insightful “UnBrandMe” podcast, delving into the professional paths of entrepreneurs and brand creators. His commitment extends beyond business; he contributes his strategic acumen to various advisory boards, fostering change management. An enthusiastic challenge pursuer, he participates in endurance sports, sometimes for fun but most times to champion sustainable living and environmental conservation.
Eva Taleva-Borislavova
CEO at Remitly Europe Limited
Eva is the CEO of Remitly Europe Limited, a global leader in digital cross-border remittances. Leading the regional strategy and business performance, Eva’s key priorities focus on driving the overall sustainable growth of the business, leading a high performing executive management team, maintaining strong customer centricity across all business operations, and building Remitly Europe's regulatory compliance position within the financial services industry. Eva is accredited as PCF 1 & 8 (Executive Director and Chief Executive) by the Central Bank of Ireland and is an Executive Director on Remitly Europe’s Board of Directors. With over 14 years of experience across the fintech/financial services industry, Eva is passionate about payments, financial inclusion, and sustainable innovation.
Tim Khamzin
CEO & Founder at Vivox.AI
Tim is the Founder and CEO of Vivox AI, where he leads the development of AI Digital Workers to streamline compliance operations for banks and fintech companies. With over 10 years of experience in the banking and fintech sectors, Tim began his career at KPMG and went on to lead key initiatives in a digital transformation program at Central Europe’s largest bank, reducing its operational workforce from 24,000 to 5,800 employees. He also scaled a Business Process Outsourcing company to $45M in revenue and developed compliance solutions for Tier 1 banks. Tim holds an MBA from London Business School and is passionate about payments, regtech, and implementing AI applications in compliance..
Steve Whiting
Director of Payments Technology at Soldo
Steve Whiting is responsible for Payments Technology at Soldo (www.soldo.com). Prior to joining forces with the Soldo founding team in 2014, Steve played a key team role in establishing Postilion for S1 as a global retail payments solution and scaling Alaric to the point of acquisition by NCR by repositioning the incumbent products into an API-first payments and AI fraud prevention orchestration suite, both of which were chasm crossing experiences.
Mark Thynne
Senior Manager Enforcement and Compliance Monitoring at PSR
Mark joined the PSR in February 2022, and he is the Senior Manager of the PSR’s Enforcement and Compliance Team. Mark’s teams focus on driving better outcomes for people and businesses by having a dedicated focus on monitoring compliance, and they can intervene when they identify non-compliance with statutory and regulatory requirements. They act in a proportionate manner, aiming to respond quickly when they identify poor compliance, particularly when it has a detrimental impact on users of payment systems or the objectives of the PSR.
The enforcement team investigates the most serious non-compliance and can sanction compliance failures. This allows the PSR to publicise their expectations of firms’ compliance, discipline poor compliance and to deter others from similar conduct.
Mark joined the PSR from the Enforcement Division of the Financial Conduct Authority, where he primarily led investigations into misconduct, including market abuse, insider dealing and fraud.
Róbert Kiszely
Director of Professional Services at Capsys
Róbert graduated from Eötvös Lóránd Science University in Computer Science. He was hired as the first Capsys employee in 1998. Over the past twenty years, he gained experience in several fields of banking and financial IT: expert consultancy, development, implementation, and support of securities settlement, pension fund administration and payment systems. Róbert has led several domestic and international projects with success. Among others, he is running professional support of Capsys’ international partnership programme, dedicating particular attention to Immediate Payments and PSD2/Open Banking. Róbert has been recognised as one of the leading experts of Immediate Payments and PSD2/Open Banking in Hungary, speaking at numerous conferences on these topics.
John Gidla
Head of Global Regulatory Research & Analysis at Vixio
John brings over a decade of experience in payments, including as an ex-regulator, to his role as Head of Global Regulatory Research and Analysis at Vixio. At Vixio, John leads the global Regulatory Intelligence team to deliver high-value content to clients and stakeholders. His previous roles have included work at the FCA, as a fintech co-founder, and as a regulatory compliance consultant.
Anu Widyalankara
Director, Payments Strategy and Technology at Ernst & Young LLP
Anu is a Payments Strategy and Technology Director at EY LLP in the UK, with over 17 years of experience in financial services. She focuses on complex transformations, M&A integration, strategy development and execution, and new payment product design for financial services and cross-sector clients. She has an emphasis across retail, commercial and investment banking, and wider payments and transactional banking, with exposure across Europe, America, Africa and Asia.
Passionate about long-term value creation, Anu helps clients design and deliver payment transformation, supporting CEOs, CTOs and CIOs with their growth, compliance and modernisation agendas.
Anu's broad range of experience in payments technologies includes Real-Time Payments, ISO 20022, Swift GPI, RTGS, Open Banking, UK New Payments Vision, Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI), CBDCs, digital assets and fraud. Her extensive experience also spans corporate treasury services, merchant services and payments infrastructure. Additionally, Anu manages key payments sector alliances and advises FinTech firms.
Briony Krikorian-Slade
Principal, Payments & Innovation at UK Finance
Briony Krikorian-Slade is Principal for Payments & Innovation at UK Finance, the trade body representing around 300 financial firms in the UK. She oversees a number of industry projects and policy areas and is coordinating UK Finance’s work on the National Payments Vision. Previously Briony worked at the UK Cards Association leading the programme to expand the use of contactless cards in the UK, including on public transport; and before that, the Association of British Insurers, running projects on motor and liability insurance.
Anton Globus
Group Director: Finance and Innovation at Paysend
Anton leads finance innovation and system change at Paysend. Paysend is a UK-headquartered global fintech on a mission to make cross-border payments simple for everyone whilst building the largest digital payment network.
Prior to Paysend Anton worked on own business projects in SaaS and tourism space, held CFO roles at Barloworld, a listed multinational industrial distributor, and prior to that was involved in consulting.
Anton is a TRIUM EMBA graduate and a Chartered Accountant (SA).
Teresa Cascino
Digital Asset Risk Management Regulatory Lead at Citibank
Teresa is Director of Emerging Innovation Risk Management in Citi's Enterprise Risk Management department, leading on digital assets risk. Before this, she was a senior policy specialist in the Fintech Hub at the Bank of England, monitoring financial stability risks coming from new developments in crypto markets and decentralised finance, and, if needed, promoting new regulation to mitigate them. She has been particularly involved in the development of the Financial Stability Board regulatory approach to crypto and decentralised finance.
Robert Courtneidge
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.
Samantha Emery
Payments Executive and NED
Samantha is a senior financial services executive and NED with unique experience spanning tier-one banks, prominent fintechs and major regulators.
Her most recent role at Lloyds Banking Group saw her leading the strategic direction on payments and overseeing critical enterprise payments service delivery. At the Financial Conduct Authority, she led across both payments supervision and the regulator’s globally recognised fintech agenda. Prior to this, she held several senior positions at NatWest GTS driving digital innovation, strategy and change.
Samantha’s non executive experience includes a term as a Director of Swift SC, also serving as the Board’s Deputy Chair. Samantha is also experienced in fintech advisory through start up and scale having supported Fnality and Form3. Samantha has been an active member of key industry groups, most recently, chairing the UK Finance workstream developing the input to the National Payments Vision.
Dan Cobley
Startup Founder, Angel Investor and Advisor; Former Managing Director at Google UK and Ireland
Dan’s career includes a dot.com bubble failure, running marketing for CapitalOne Europe and various roles at Google, ending up as head of the UK business.
In 2014, he left Google to become a fintech entrepreneur, co-founding ClearScore, Salary Finance and Koodoo Mortgage.
He is now a full-time angel investor, advisor and NED, focusing mostly on fintech, and commerce-tech/mar-tech, investing in early-stage UK (S)EIS companies and trying to over-index on minority founders.
Jovi Overo
CEO at ONE.io
Jovi Overo is a fintech executive with a track record of building and scaling regulated infrastructure across banking, payments, and digital assets. With 2 decades of leadership experience spanning Europe, the Middle East, and frontier markets, he specialises in go-to-market execution, regulatory navigation, and product-commercial fit. Jovi has led global teams across crypto-native and traditional finance environments, advising founders and boards on how to close the gap between innovation and compliance in a post-crypto, programmable finance era.
Chris Aruliah
Chief Commercial Officer at Agant
Chris leads the Commercial team at Agant, Britain’s leading GBP stablecoin issuer for institutions. Prior to Agant, Chris was a pioneer in mobile banking and payments for the AIM-listed company Monitise. Following Monitise, Chris entered the world of crypto, launching and leading Token in Europe in 2016 and then going on to lead banking and then business development at Bitstamp. From Bitstamp, Chris joined the Exec team at BCB Group, a banking and payments EMI for the crypto industry, where he led the commercial and client services teams. More recently, Chris headed up OTC business development at Wincent, one of the world’s largest crypto hedge funds.
Chris’s experience across banking, payments, crypto and capital markets has given him a unique perspective on how stablecoins bridge the world of traditional finance and crypto, combining the benefits of both worlds.
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Heather O’Gorman
Head of Digital Assets at fscom
Heather leads the Digital Assets practice at fscom, with extensive expertise in governance, risk, and compliance within the payments services and cryptoassets industries. She has supported crypto firms through the FCA’s cryptoasset registration process, ensuring robust compliance programs tailored to unique business models. Heather has supported payments firms through FCA authorisations and supervision engagements, mitigating risks and resolving regulatory issues effectively. Heather regularly advises on complex regulatory enforcement actions, providing practical solutions to meet compliance standards while minimising business disruption.
Pablo Villegas
EMEA Payments Industry Lead at Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Pablo is the EMEA Payments Industry Lead at AWS, defining and executing strategy whilst driving transformative cloud solutions with payments providers. Pablo plays a key role shaping industry priorities, steering innovation and operational resilience for global and local organisations, delivering results in complex industry challenges.
Chastity Murphy
Former U.S. Treasury, Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Manchester
Chastity is a former Senior Advisor for Financial Institutions, managing the cryptocurrency, digital assets, consumer protections, and financial inclusion portfolios and is now also a Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Manchester. Chastity held roles previously as a senior economic policy advisor for Representative Rashida Tlaib, pioneering legislation on e-cash, stablecoins and digital assets. As a policy advisor, she managed Tlaib’s Financial Services Committee and worked on anti-austerity, financial reform, racial equity, and financial inclusion policies. Chastity also worked with Representative Marcia Fudge as a legislative aide. Chastity has also been a cooperative education student and analyst at the Federal Reserve Board of Governors. In 2020, Chastity was featured in the Forbes article “Women of Color Hill Staffers Talk New Economic Policy Making, Digital Cash Without Blockchain.” Chastity lives in Washington, D.C., and has a political science and economics B.A. from South Carolina State University.
Grant Evans
Vice President of Sales & Partnerships at Worldpay
Grant Evans is Vice President of Sales & Partnerships at Worldpay for Platforms UK. Worldpay for Platforms enables software companies to embed a host of payments and financial features into their platforms via a single integration. A leading voice in the payments industry, Grant is a two-time LinkedIn Top Voice, writer of the popular Payments Shed Newsletter and Co-Host of The Payments Shed Podcast.
Geraldine Kraev
Global Innovation Leader at Financial Conduct Authority (FCA)
Geraldine Kraev is the Innovation Manager focusing on Global Innovation at the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), where she leads international innovation engagement initiatives, including the Global Financial Innovation Network (GFIN). She plays a key role in shaping the FCA’s global innovation strategy and is widely recognised for her work in fostering cross-border collaboration and supporting responsible innovation in financial services. A regular speaker and moderator at international industry events, regulatory forums and trade summits, Geraldine is known for her thought leadership in the intersection of regulation and innovation. She spearheaded the GFIN Greenwashing TechSprint – an
international initiative uniting firms and regulators to develop cutting-edge solutions to combat greenwashing in financial services. Geraldine joined the FCA in 2020 from the Swiss Embassy in London. Prior to that, she served as Director of Operations at a geopolitical think tank. Her career has been defined by her ability to bridge sectors and geographies to drive impactful, forward-looking innovation.
Hana Rolles
Chief Commercial Officer at Bank of London
Hana has over two decades of experience in technology and payments, holding prominent leadership roles with Visa, Paynetics, Vodafone and McKinsey & Company. Hana’s expertise includes scaling businesses and managing commercial teams across Europe and Asia.
Jane Jee
Director at Jee Associates Limited
Jane is Company Secretary at a data analytics company – Numitor Limited, a consultant at Risk Alert 247 Ltd – a company which analyses Companies House data to enable AML regulated entities to better assess risk.
Jane leads the anti-financial crime initiative at Co-Labs Global Limited and she is also the Lead at the Payments Association’s Financial Crime Working Group.
After qualifying as a barrister, Jane gained broad experience in the payments industry. She was Managing Director at Access (credit cards) and then Divisional Manager at Mondex International (e-money) . Jane has undertaken a broad range of legal and compliance work for a variety of companies - including internet payment gateways - WorldPay plc and Trust Payments, mobile phone payment companies, e-money issuers, pre-paid card companies and money transmitters.
Jane holds an International Compliance Association (ICA) Post Graduate Diploma in Governance, Risk and Compliance and is an ICA Fellow. Jane was CEO and co-founder at Kompli-Global. which offered SaaS to defeat fraud and money laundering.
Jane is a long-term advocate of the use of technology (RegTech) in addition to human judgement to defeat Financial crime.
Boris Diakonov
Co-founder and Co-CEO at ANNA Money
Boris Diakonov was born in Russia in 1977. As a child he was so desperate to be a doctor, he got a job as a hospital porter when he was just 12. He learnt basic medical skills, and was taught how to administer injections, but his passions soon moved onto another topic: religion. Keen to become a pastor, he studied theology and other humanities in Centenary College of Louisiana in America. While studying, he tried building the college intranet, which kick-started his love of the Internet and all things tech.
Abandoning his theological dreams, he returned to Russia and started Tochka, a digital bank for entrepreneurs. After moving to the UK, he co-founded ANNA in 2017 with Eduard Panteleev. He’s a fan of sailing (he’s a master mariner) and believes in running the business as a holacracy.
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