Events

Ahmed Abdelaal is the CEO of Mashreq Bank Group, one of the UAE’s best performing banks for over five decades and a leading financial institution with an expanding footprint across the Middle East, Asia, Europe and USA. The group incorporates local and overseas operations, Oman Insurance, Mashreq Capital, Mashreq Al Islami, Mashreq Securities, Shorouq Commodities Trading, Mindscape, Makaseb, Injaz and Osool finance. In his current role, Ahmed is committed to leading and delivering on the bank’s strategy and ensuring its growth trajectory. As a banking professional with over 25 years of experience in progressively senior roles across banking verticals spanning international and regional banks, Ahmed possesses a proven track record of delivering strong results in the face of challenging environment and owns extensive experience in managing senior teams across multi geographies as well as attracting, mentoring and retaining top talents. He has widespread experience and exceptional financial acumen across banking products; covering a wide range of disciplines and hands-on knowledge of solutions in the areas of Corporate and Banking; including trade finance, contracting and real estate finance, payment and cash management, and also Investment Banking, including DCM, ECM, Project Finance and advisory, as well as Islamic banking, portfolio management, in addition to full familiarity with global markets products, structured trade and working capital solutions. Prior to his current role, he was the Group Head of Corporate and Investment Banking at Mashreq Bank. He has also served in senior roles across international and regional banks, including Arab Bank, ABN AMRO Bank, American Express and most recently, HSBC Middle East. During his 10-year tenure with HSBC Middle East, Ahmed was appointed Regional Head of Corporate Clients Coverage and Head of Commercial Banking UAE and was responsible for managing and developing the strategic direction of HSBC’s Corporate Banking franchise in MENAT. Ahmed holds an MBA from London Business School, University of London, UK and BA in Economics and Political Sciences (Major Economics) from Faculty of Economics and Political Sciences, Cairo University Egypt.

Rana Beydoun is the Head of Financial Institutions at the Commercial Bank of Dubai, managing both Banks and Non-Bank Financial Institutions. Prior to that, she lead a similar position at BLOM Bank where she was responsible for relationships and business development activities with banks/ financial institutions globally. Her career spans 20 years in banking. She has been engaged with BAFT during the past 8 years, and currently is the co-chair of the BAFT MENA Council.

Francesco is the Chief Executive Officer at Barclays Europe. Based in Dublin, he serves on the Board of Barclays Bank Ireland PLC, and leads the Barclays Europe Executive Committee. Barclays Europe is Barclays’ principal platform for regulated activities in the EEA. It has approximately €93bn in IFRS total assets and €3bn in equity. Francesco joined Barclays in London in 2010, as Global Head of Barclays Corporate Development, where in addition to corporate activity on Barclays’ behalf, he was responsible for all Principal Investments across Barclays Group. In 2018, he moved to the Investment Bank as Co-Head of Barclays EME Financial Institutions Group and was subsequently appointed Chief Executive Officer for Barclays Europe in 2020. Prior to Barclays, Francesco worked as a Senior Banker at JP Morgan in New York. Before JP Morgan, he held a number of senior roles at Bear Sterns, Lazard and GE Capital.

Esther Galiana is the Global Head of Financial Institutions at BBVA. She is also involved in BBVA´s agenda regarding transformation and sustainability. Ms. Galiana has extensive corporate & investment banking experience combined with corporate experience in the health care sector. Additionally, she has been active in strategy and business development at BBVA e-commerce and BBVA Wholesale Banking & Asset Management. Prior to BBVA, she worked with Santander New York in Structured Trade Finance. Earlier in her career, Ms. Galiana worked at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston in banking supervision. She has been Vice Chair of BAFT and co-chair of the BAFT Europe Council. Ms. Galiana is also a professor at the Masters in Banking and Financial Regulation of the University of Navarra.

Mark Garfield’s current role is Head of Global Financial Institutions at Zions Bancorporation responsible for foreign bank relationship development. He joined Zions Bancorporation in 2005. He has over 30 years of banking experience with 25 years in international banking management covering trade finance, trade services, foreign exchange, correspondent banking and product development. Throughout his career he has worked closely with corporate and commercial entities in the Midwest and Western U.S. providing banking support for cross-border trade. Mr. Garfield currently serves as a Director of BAFT and Chair of the Utah District Export Council. He served on the DEC National Advisory Board and Board of the World Trade Center, Utah.

Rob Nichols is the president and CEO of the American Bankers Association, which represents banks of all sizes and charters and is the voice for the nation’s $20 trillion banking industry. Rob joined ABA in August 2015 following ten years at the helm of the Financial Services Forum, a non-partisan financial and economic policy organization. Before joining the Forum, Rob served in the George W. Bush administration as the assistant secretary for public affairs at the Treasury Department, a position requiring confirmation by the United States Senate. In this role, he acted as chief spokesperson and head of the office of public liaison, serving as Treasury’s lead representative with the media, business, professional trade organizations, consumer groups and the public. Rob’s earlier career highlights include working as communications director to U.S. Sen. Slade Gorton and press secretary to the late Rep. Jennifer Dunn, a former member of the House leadership, and in the West Wing as an aide in the Office of the Chief of Staff in the George H.W. Bush administration.

Mr. Ramez T. Shehadi is the Managing Director of Facebook for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). He leads the commercial growth and impact of Facebook and its expanding portfolio of apps, services and businesses across the region. Mr. Shehadi brings extensive expertise in establishing, scaling and running regional and global lines of business and cross-industry portfolios for top-tier global consulting firms, most notably as Senior Partner and Managing Director of the MENA portfolio of Booz Allen Hamilton, Lead Partner of the MENA Digital Business & Technology practice of Booz & Company and Global Co-Lead of Booz Digital, among others.

Derek White is the Vice President of Global Financial Services at Google Cloud. He is responsible for setting the go-to-market strategy and partnering with banks, insurance companies and other financial services entities to transform and help redefine their core businesses into state of the art digital operations, while also creating new solutions, products, and capabilities. Derek is a technology and innovation leader, bringing with him more than 20 years of experience in transforming financial services. Prior to Google Cloud, he served as the chief digital officer for U.S. Bank, and earlier in his career, Derek was the global head of client solutions for BBVA. Derek also held several leadership roles at Barclays, including chief design and digital officer. He was also the technology ambassador for London, actively promoting the UK market as a fintech capital.

Yasar Yilmaz is a digital transformation strategist specialized in financial services industry with 20+ years of experience spanning across Turkey, Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa. He is a design thinking led innovation practitioner and a blockchain enthusiast. Throughout many technology led reimagined business process improvement engagements for financial services industry customers along his career at PwC, Oracle, SunGard-FIS, Capgemini, SAP and Microsoft, Yasar has been striving to help the C-suite members craft strategic value realization roadmaps for their business renovation pursuits. Yasar is currently busy with helping financial services institutions drive value out of the convergence of key transformational technologies that are Data / Artificial Intelligence, Robotics Process Automation, Internet of Things, Blockchain, Cloud Platforms, Open Banking / Insurance and Low Code Development.

Maram Al-Jazireh is SVP/ Global Head of Financial Institutions at Arab Bank and is responsible for relationships and business development activities with financial institutions globally. She is also a member of the Financial Institutions Credit Committee. Maram grew up in Kuwait and graduated from Oklahoma State University with a major in Accounting. Prior to joining Arab Bank in 2001, she worked at Talal Abu-Ghazaleh International, Cairo Amman Bank, Citibank N.A, Amman and ABN Amro Bank, Dubai. She is co-chair of BAFT MENA Council and an advisory board member of Beyond Capital’s governance committee. She is also a fellow of the Middle East Leadership Initiative, a member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network and founder of Mid The Art Reach Project.

Dr Ahmed Attiga is the CEO of the Arab Petroleum Investments Corporation (APICORP), a multilateral development financial institution. Previously, he was with the IFC and was responsible for investment and advisory services activities in the Middle East, overseeing an investment portfolio of over US$2.7 Billion and an advisory program of about US$200m. Dr. Attiga served at the Board of Executive Directors of the World Bank Group in Washington, D.C as well as a Manager of a Private Equity fund for the State of Wisconsin in the United States of America. He also advised Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) on privatization and restructuring strategies. In his early career, he held teaching and research positions at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research.

Tod Burwell is the President and Chief Executive Officer of BAFT. Prior to being promoted to CEO, he served as the Senior Vice President of Trade Products with oversight of all trade-related initiatives including the Global Trade Industry Council, Trade Committees, and other strategic initiatives of the organization. Mr. Burwell has over 25 years of trade, supply chain and cash management experience as a banking practitioner, as well as serving as a consultant to global corporations and suppliers of strategically integrated trade solutions. Prior to joining BAFT, Mr. Burwell was a Managing Director at JPMorgan Chase and held senior global management roles responsible for trade operations, launching the logistics business and managing global product sales for trade finance and logistics management.

Tod Burwell is the President and Chief Executive Officer of BAFT. Prior to being promoted to CEO, he served as the Senior Vice President of Trade Products with oversight of all trade-related initiatives including the Global Trade Industry Council, Trade Committees, and other strategic initiatives of the organization. Mr. Burwell has over 25 years of trade, supply chain and cash management experience as a banking practitioner, as well as serving as a consultant to global corporations and suppliers of strategically integrated trade solutions. Prior to joining BAFT, Mr. Burwell was a Managing Director at JPMorgan Chase and held senior global management roles responsible for trade operations, launching the logistics business and managing global product sales for trade finance and logistics management.

Mark Garfield’s current role is Head of Global Financial Institutions at Zions Bancorporation responsible for foreign bank relationship development. He joined Zions Bancorporation in 2005. He has over 30 years of banking experience with 25 years in international banking management covering trade finance, trade services, foreign exchange, correspondent banking and product development. Throughout his career he has worked closely with corporate and commercial entities in the Midwest and Western U.S. providing banking support for cross-border trade. Mr. Garfield currently serves as a Director of BAFT and Chair of the Utah District Export Council. He served on the DEC National Advisory Board and Board of the World Trade Center, Utah.

Wim Mijs was appointed Chief Executive Officer of the European Banking Federation in 2014. Between 2007 and 2014 Mr. Mijs served as CEO of the Dutch banking association NVB. During this tenure he transformed the NVB into a modern industry association, positioning it as the key representative of the banking sector in the wake of the financial crisis. He studied law at the University of Leiden in the Netherlands, specialising in European and International law. After his studies he worked at the International Court of Arbitration at the Peace Palace in The Hague. In 1993 he joined ABN AMRO in Amsterdam before moving to Brussels to head up the bank’s EU liaison office. Mr. Mijs moved back to The Hague in 2002 where he became the Head of Government Affairs for ABN AMRO. Wim is a member of the Advisory Board of the BBVA Center for Financial Education and Capability, the Industry Chair of the European Parliamentary Financial Services Forum and member of the Advisory board of Leiden Law School. Between 2011 and 2018, Wim held various institutional roles within the international and European financial/banking community: chairman of the International Banking Federation; chairman of the Executive Committee.

Fabio M. Natalucci is a Deputy Director of the Monetary and Capital Markets Department with responsibility for the IMF’s global financial markets monitoring and systemic risk assessment functions. He is responsible for the Global Financial Stability Report that gives the IMF’s assessment of global financial stability risks. Prior to joining the IMF, Mr. Natalucci was a Senior Associate Director in the Division of Monetary Affairs at the Federal Reserve Board, where he conducted research and current analysis on the relationship between monetary policy, financial regulatory policy, and financial stability. Between October 2016 and June 2017, Mr. Natalucci was Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Financial Stability and Regulation at the U.S. Department of Treasury. His responsibilities included leading U.S. engagement on financial regulatory cooperation in the G-20, representing the U.S. Treasury at the Financial Stability Board, coordinating between domestic and international post-crisis regulatory reforms, and monitoring developments and vulnerabilities in global financial markets. Fabio holds a PhD in Economics from New York University.

Rob Nichols is the president and CEO of the American Bankers Association, which represents banks of all sizes and charters and is the voice for the nation’s $20 trillion banking industry. Rob joined ABA in August 2015 following ten years at the helm of the Financial Services Forum, a non-partisan financial and economic policy organization. Before joining the Forum, Rob served in the George W. Bush administration as the assistant secretary for public affairs at the Treasury Department, a position requiring confirmation by the United States Senate. In this role, he acted as chief spokesperson and head of the office of public liaison, serving as Treasury’s lead representative with the media, business, professional trade organizations, consumer groups and the public. Rob’s earlier career highlights include working as communications director to U.S. Sen. Slade Gorton and press secretary to the late Rep. Jennifer Dunn, a former member of the House leadership, and in the West Wing as an aide in the Office of the Chief of Staff in the George H.W. Bush administration.