James Eves

30 years: Equity capital markets

Career banker with over 25 years working in investment banking. James has worked in many aspects of banking including equity capital markets, origination, IPOs and hybrid capital.

Carl Fernandes

20 years: Financial services law & regulation

Carl is a partner in the financial services regulatory team at Linklaters. He has been a financial services regulatory lawyer for the last 20 years, practicing in both London and Hong Kong.

Frances Coppola

25 years: Economic commentary & banking

Frances has spent 17 years working for assorted banks, retail and investment banks, and even a charity. During her banking career she designed risk management systems for Nat West, and financial & regulatory reporting systems for Midland Bank (now HSBC) and RBS Group. In 2019, she published a book on “people’s quantitative easing”.

Lindsey Matthews

30 years: Risk management & derivatives trading

Lindsey runs Perfordiant, an investment risk and performance consulting firm. He has worked in financial markets since 1992. Lindsey became an MD in fixed income and equities, ran a Risk function, and was on the management team of an Asset Management fintech business. Lindsey is now a Visiting Fellow at the Henley Business School, and resides on the board of CFA UK.

Abdulla Javeri

30 years: Financial markets trader

Abdulla’s career in the financial markets started in 1990 when he entered the trading floor of the London International Financial Futures Exchange, LIFFE, and qualified as a pit trader in equity and equity index options. In 1996, Abdulla became a trainer for regulatory qualifications and then for non-exam courses, primarily covering all major financial products.

Michael Torpey

30 years: Treasury & banking

Michael began his career working with the Irish Finance Ministry. In 1992 he joined Irish Permanent Building Society as its first Treasurer and in 2000 became Finance Director at First Active. In 2010 he set up a specialist banking unit to lead the Irish State’s handling of the banking crisis. In 2013 Michael became Chief Executive of the Bank of Ireland until he retired in 2018.

Prasad Gollakota

20 years: Capital markets & banking

Prasad has spent 20 years working in financial services, where he spent the majority of his time at UBS, with his last role there being Managing Director within the combined Debt and Equity capital markets business. Before joining xUnlocked, Prasad worked at an Infrastructure and Renewables advisory business, where he delivered projects such as financing the largest operational solar farm in Australia. Prasad is Chief Content Officer at xUnlocked, a B Corp best known for its flagship learning platform 'Sustainability Unlocked', serving global clients that include Santander, Airbus and the London Stock Exchange.

David Leeming

25 years: Trading & derivatives

David has over 20 years trading interest rate products. Starting with Italian and Spanish markets in the 90’s enabled him to move to Brazil and then onto Hong Kong. Returning to the UK he ran the GBP Rates Desk at UBS in London trading IRS and Swaptions. He also served on the ISDA Rates Steering Committee and London Clearing Houses’ Default Management Committee.

Kees van den Aarssen

35 years: FX & financial markets

Kees has over 30 years of experience in Financial Markets. He has sophisticated expertise in sales and trading roles working in Foreign Exchange and Money Markets. He now conducts seminars, workshops and training courses for clients all over the world.

January Carmalt

20 years: Research & banking

January began her career in 1999 with Bank of America in Charlotte, NC. From the Credit Products team, she moved into fixed income bond research covering Telecoms and Financials. While in London, January focused on financial institutions bond research until her Director and head bond analyst role at Deutsche Bank. As of 2011, January has worked as a freelance writer.

Peter Eisenhardt

30 years: Capital markets & investment banking

Peter has over 30 years experience working in banking. He has held several senior positions in international investment banks. Peter is now the Secretary General of the International Council of Securities Associations

Christian Hunt

25 years: Behavioural science & compliance

Christian is the founder of Human Risk, a Behavioural Science led Consulting and Training Firm. Previously, Christian was Managing Director at UBS, and Head of Behavioural Science (BeSci), within the Bank’s Risk function. Prior to joining UBS, he was Chief Operating Officer at the UK’s Prudential Regulation Authority.

Stephanie Sfakianos

35 years: Sustainable finance & banking

Stephanie's long career in the financial services industry in London culminated around the past seven years in the field of sustainable finance. She has now left the banking industry, but has continued to apply her sustainable finance expertise through her work with ICMA and the International Standards Organisation.

Trevor Williams

25 years: Macroeconomist in banking

Trevor is a visiting professor at the University of Derby and an economic consultant. He is the author of several books and articles and is former Chief Economist of Lloyds Banking Group.

Alexandra Perez

Early stage business funding specialist

Alexandra is currently completing her MBA at the University of Oxford, where she is the Director of the Oxford Seed Fund. Prior to her MBA, Alexandra built and led the marketing function for a boutique consultancy in London where she later became a management consultant for blue-chip corporates. Most recently she has been consulting for various PropTech companies.

Farouk Ramzan

25 years: Senior executive in banking

A thirty year career in Investment and Commercial Banking in London and New York focused on Debt Capital Markets. More latterly Farouk was Head of European Commercial Banking for the Lloyds Group. Farouk now focuses on diverse projects where he can demystify complex financing structures with a much more interesting social impact crowd.

Gavin Ryan

25 years: Private equity & banking

Gavin Ryan has twenty years’ experience as a private equity fund manager. He has managed a $30m Advent International Affiliate Fund, a $200m Fund part of Soros Fund Management and a €2.5bn Green Energy Asset Manager. Before he was in investment banking with HSBC and Nomura. Gavin has an Engineering Degree from Cambridge and an MBA from McGill.

Harry Davies

Early stage business funding specialist

Harry Davies has spent the last few years investing in and supporting early-stage technology startups, and has worked with over 200+ startups. He started doing this at Wayra, O2 and Telefonica’s startup accelerator, where they would invest in companies that had a strategic fit with Telefonica, across telecoms, fintech, cyber security, healthcare and more. Harry has since moved to Tech Nation, a UK Government backed body that supports the UK tech sector.

Keith Mullin

35 years: Capital markets editorial

Keith is the founder and director of KM Capital Markets, a media and thought-leadership consultancy. He spent the past 35 years working in specialist capital markets media and has had a ring-side seat at all of the major market events. Prior to setting up KM Capital Markets in 2017, Keith worked at Thomson Reuters.

Kent Matthews

35 years: Professor in economics & finance

Kent is an academic who has studied at several institutions including the London School of Economics and the University of Liverpool. He is now a Professor of Banking and Finance at Cardiff Business School.

Kevin Gardiner

30 years: Macroeconomist

Kevin has worked in the city for over 30 years, with experience as an economist, investor strategist and chief investment officer. Kevin proudly coined the term "Celtic Tiger" used to refer to the Irish economy.

Lee Bartholomew

15 years: Fixed income markets

Lee is the Global Head of Fixed Income Product R&D at Eurex, one of the largest derivatives exchanges in the world. Eurex is one of the largest companies within the Deutsche Boerse Group.

Richard Boardman

20 years: Sales & Trading

Since joining the City as an underwriter, Richard has been fascinated by the connectivity and roles played by various parts of the Square Mile. He spent many years in asset management before moving into banking in various derivatives and solutions roles. Recently, Richard took a year out and worked with Finance Unlocked to spark further fascination and interest in finance.

Richard Kemmish

30 years: Capital markets & covered bonds

Richard is a consultant working mainly in the covered bond market. He helps Finance Ministries and Central Banks in countries without covered bond laws to put legal frameworks in place. He has also helped the European Commission with their legislative agenda for covered bonds and related products.

Rob Baston

35 years: Securitisation

Rob has worked in banking for almost 40 years. He has spent the vast majority of his time in the industry at UBS, where he is now a Managing Director working on specific private projects for the firm and acting as a senior advisor. Prior to this role he ran the Capital Solutions team at UBS, advising European banks on placing AT1 and T2 capital, debt for equity recapitalisations and rights offerings. Prior to working in the industry, Rob completed his D. Phil in Mathematics at the University of Oxford.

Saket Modi

20 years: Chartered accountant & educator

Saket is a financial trainer and consultant based out of London. He specialises in advanced accounting, financial reporting and financial analysis, particularly with regards to International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS) and Financial instruments.

Sharmila Whelan

20 years: Asian economics & policy

Sharmila is Deputy Chief Economist of Asionomics Group. A top ranked Asain economist with over 20 years experience analysing Asian economies and policy makers.

Ted Wainman

20 years: CA & educator

Ted Wainman trained and qualified as an Associate Chartered Accountant (ACA) with Ernst & Young before joining JPMorgan on the Investment Management side of the business. He since has over 17 years of experience in designing, developing and delivering financial & business skills training workshops for over 275 clients in more than 35 countries.

Tim Hall

30 years: Debt capital markets

Tim has nearly 30 years of experience in the international capital markets at major global institutions and has worked both on the buy-side and the sell-side. He has worked with numerous companies, banks and governments in developed and emerging markets on investment grade and high yield bond issues, from straight-forward to very complex acquisition/leveraged financings. Tim has also been on the board of a UK “challenger bank.” Tim has an MBA from the Wharton School, and is a CFA.

Tim Skeet

35 years: Debt capital markets

Banker with more than 35 years experience in the financial markets. Tim has been an ICMA board member and an ECBC steering committee member. Tim is a Freeman of the City of London.

Trevor Pugh

20 years: Trading & hedge funds

Trevor has worked in finance since 1995. He started his career in investment banking after studying Law at Cambridge and taking a Masters Degree in Financial Services from University College Dublin. Trevor spent 18 years at Barclays investment bank where he became a Managing Director and head of Gilt trading. He currently works as Chief Operating Officer for a hedge fund.

Rupert Walford

25 years: Capital markets

Rupert has over 25 years of experience in the financial services industry working mainly in international capital markets. He is currently a Managing Director at RBC Capital Markets in London responsible for ECM Execution and Healthcare ECM and Corporate Broking in Europe. Rupert was previously at Linklaters for 8 years, at UBS Investment Bank for 9 years as Head of Global Capital Markets Legal and as a member of UBS's ECM Execution team and subsequently at Deutsche Bank in Compliance covering ECM and Corporate Broking. Rupert has extensive experience in a wide range of investment banking transactions in EMEA, predominantly in the emerging markets and in particular Russia. He is also a qualified lawyer.

Imran Lakha

20 years: Equity derivatives trading

Imran has been an equity derivatives trader for over 20 years and has run European equity index options trading desks for Merrill Lynch and Citibank. He also spent time as a macro portfolio manager at Bluecrest Capital. Currently, Imran runs his own training company specialising in teaching people how to trade options. This is: Options Insight - Traders That Teach, www.options-insight.com

Thanos Papasavvas, CFA

30 years: Asset management

Thanos is the Founder and Chief Investment Officer of ABP Invest, which he established in 2015 to provide strategic outlook and research on geopolitics, economics, markets and FX for financial and non-financial institutions. Prior to founding ABP Invest, Thanos worked at Credit Suisse Asset Management, Investec Asset Management and the UK Government Economic Service.

Gontran de Quillacq

25 years: Derivatives trading & ETFs

Gontran de Quillacq has 25 years of experience in derivatives trading, portfolio management, proprietary trading, structured products and investment research. He has worked with top-tier banks and hedge funds in both London and New York.

Alex Struc

20 years: Asset management

Alex is a fixed income investor with deep credit expertise. His work on liquid impact investing, deep expertise in financial markets, and a strong belief in the power of scalable frameworks to outperform and foster positive change drove him to found GOALSFIRST with a single vision of unlocking the full value of finance for change. Prior to founding GOALSFIRST, Alex managed credit assets for PIMCO for nearly fifteen years, including the firmwide exposure to financials and the world largest bank capital fund. In 2014 he was named FN’s 40 under 40 asset managers for his work in this sector. In his earlier years, he built the firm’s European bank loan business and positioned PIMCO as a liquidity provider in that space by introducing relative value trading to this seemingly illiquid asset class.

Ali Chabaane

25 years: Investment management

With over 20 years of experience leading investment teams across equity, fixed income and multi-asset portfolios, Ali is now Managing Director at Fastnet Asset Management which provides portfolio managers with insights on how active performance is generated and how to enhance it. Prior to Fastnet, Ali has previously been Global Head of Portfolio Construction at Amundi, and Head of Credit Risk Methodologies at BNP Paribas.

Sir Ronald Cohen

Father of impact investing

Sir Ronald Cohen is the Chairman of the Global Steering Group for Impact Investment, the Impact-Weighted Accounts Initiative at Harvard Business School and The Portland Trust. At the start of his career, he co-founded the private equity firm Apax Partners. In 2020, he wrote the bestselling book “Impact: Reshaping capitalism to drive real change”. Considered the Father of Social Investment, in 2012 he received the Rockefeller Foundation’s Innovation Award for innovation in social finance.

Faisal Sheikh

25 years: Wealth and risk management specialist

Faisal is a wealth management professional has spent almost 30 years working in the field of risk management, risk control, internal auditing in the financial services and public sector. Most recently, Faisal was the Head of Risk for the Wealth Management business of UBS in the UK. He has also extensive international experience across Europe, the Americas, Asia and Africa. He has also a served as CISI operational risk expert panel member.

Permjit Singh

25 years: Corporate treasury

Permjit Singh is the founder of Cash for Invoices, a provider of short-term cash secured by companies' trade invoices. His PhD was on asset securitisation, and he holds a Diploma from the UK Association of Corporate Treasurers. He is the author of The City and global financial services.

Arun Kelshiker

20 years: Asset management and stewardship

Arun Kelshiker was formerly the Head of Asset Allocation and Portfolio Strategy at Standard Chartered Bank and part of the bank's Global Investment Committee, where he provided investment advisory and multi-asset portfolio solutions. His focus is now with Cambridge Sustainable Investment Partners, which draws its expertise from the Resilience and Sustainable Development Centre at Cambridge University. He is also a university lecturer at the Frankfurt School of Finance and Management and is Vice Chair of the CFA UK's Inclusion and Diversity Committee and its Investment Committee.

Denitsa Georgieva

Stewardship Specialist

Denitsa Georgieva is part of Tumelo, an innovative Fintech business that uses technology to help pension providers and investment platforms engage their underlying investors. She focuses on establishing a connection between underlying investors and their fund manager. This aims to enable better transparency and accountability across the investment value chain.