PIMFA Compliance Conference 2024

Alex joined PIMFA in June 2017 as a Policy Adviser, where she works on a wide range of regulatory matters, engaging with policy makers and the regulator to promote members’ interests.

She previously worked for the Association of Professional Financial Advisers (APFA) in the same capacity. APFA merged with the Wealth Management Association (WMA) to form PIMFA.

Alex has a legal background, having studied law at Cambridge University and was called to the Bar in 1997. She was a tenant at Lamb Chambers, Temple where she specialised in personal injury claims, contractual disputes and professional negligence. Alex has experience of advisory, drafting and court work including appearances in the Court of Appeal, the High Court and county courts.

Lucy has worked at the FCA since 2008 across a variety of different roles. The majority of her career has been spent in Supervision, but she also has extensive experience of designing and implementing policy, having overseen the implementation of the Mortgage Market Review and the overhaul of the financial promotions rules for high risk investments. She also spent a year in Authorisations, as Head of Department for dual-regulated firms.

Clive is a partner in our Financial Services Regulatory practice; and head of the advisory (non-contentious) team in London.

Clive is a leading financial services law and regulation lawyer. With extensive City experience, including time as a banking regulator with the Bank of England and in-house, Clive advises banks, asset managers, insurers and other financial institutions on a wide range of regulatory and compliance matters across the financial services, banking and funds sectors.

Feedback from clients for Clive’s work includes praise for his “client responsiveness, business sense and ability to manage his legal team” and that “whenever we deal with EU matters, he’s extremely responsive, and he understands our business very well.”

Areas of special sector expertise are banking, asset management (including private wealth management) and securities regulation.

Chris acts for a number of banks and other financial institutions, primarily on contentious regulatory matters. He advises clients on internal investigations, FCA and PRA enforcement matters and on interactions with the FOS. His experience in contentious matters also informs his advice to clients on regulatory compliance particularly with respect to culture, governance and conduct risk.

Chris has been on secondment to three international investment banks in both London and New York; this in-house experience has led him to understand better the needs of his clients in order to produce clear, focussed assistance and advice.

Chris specialises in issues facing wholesale banks, particularly in relation to market abuse. He has acted on some of the most high-profile contentious regulatory matters in the market, including in connection with LIBOX and FX investigations, Skilled Persons’ Reviews and Parliamentary investigations.
He also specialises in matters relating to culture and governance, acting in the Salz Review of Barclays and the Kelly Review of the Co-Operative Bank.

Chris is dual qualified in England & Wales and in New York. He spent two years on secondment to Herbert Smith Freehills’ office where he acted on matters involving investigations by the SEC and DOJ.

Maja joined PIMFA as Senior Policy Adviser, EU and Government Affairs in November 2018. She is a former diplomat, public affairs and policy official with extensive experience of international, European and UK government and policy operations.

At PIMFA, Maja is responsible for developing policy and implementing the associated advocacy work with key EU and UK institutions, including the European Commission, Parliament, and Council, HMG, and the FCA, on a range of European and UK legislative and regulatory issues.

Prior to PIMFA, Maja worked at the City of London Corporation as an European Policy and European Regulation Adviser, focusing on Brexit related issues and on strengthening the dialogue between the UK-based financial and professional services industry, the UK government, regulatory authorities, EU institutions and Member States. While in the diplomatic service, Maja worked on numerous policy initiatives, engagement strategies and advocacy efforts, including Croatia’s negotiations for membership of the EU and NATO.

Maja was educated at the University of Zagreb, Croatia.

Julia has specialised in sustainable and responsible investment (SRI) for nearly three decades.  She is a passionate advocate of the need for investors to pay far more attention to sustainability – believing that it is not only necessary, but financially sound and what many clients want.

Julia has run her own business, SRI Services, since 2010.  SRI Services is primarily focused on helping retail financial services professionals to build sustainable investment into their businesses. Their focus is the open to all, ‘whole of SRI market’, Fund EcoMarket database tool – which is free to use thanks to fund partner support.

Julia is on the FCA’s Disclosure and Labels Advisory Group (DLAG) – helping shape the SDR. She is also the technical author of the British Standards Institution’s Fund PAS (BSI PAS 7342) which is due to publish in late 2023.  Julia is also the lead author of the PIMFA ESG Academy.

Awarded ‘Best Sustainable & ESG Support Provider’ by Investment Week in 2021 their work is specialised but diverse, inducing working closely with B2B and D2C fund platforms and portfolio providers.  Julia is also a regular conference speaker, media commentator and award judge.

Julia previously ran the sustainable investment area in Friends Provident (1996-2008), having first become involved in sustainable investment at NPI in 1991 (now respectively part of Aviva and Janus Henderson). She has previously served three (non-consecutive) terms as a director at industry not-for-profit UKSIF.

Kevin Sloane has worked in financial services for over 40 years.
His areas of interest and expertise are wealth management operations and technology.

Kevin is a Chartered Member of the Chartered Institute of Securities and Investment and is a member of the CISI’s Wealth Management Forum Committee.

Jeff has over 25 years’ experience in financial institutions. He has held directorship roles in KYC Operations and the prevention of financial crime.

Having worked with 12 of the world’s top 75 tier 1 banks in the world and various other financial services companies as well as professional services firms, Jeff has enjoyed a fulfilling career in aiding implementation and delivery of new and existing regulatory requirements including organisational change programmes driven out of the need to drive profits in a regulated environment.

Clients enjoy working with Jeff for his acute commercial awareness and his decisiveness under pressure. Through years of experience, Jeff has developed a thorough working knowledge of the FCA handbook and understands multiple approaches to compliance and risk.

Jeff is a member of:

Chartered Fellow of the Chartered Institute for Securities & Investment (CISI)
The International Compliance Association (ICA)
The Chartered Insurance Institute(CII)
A Fellow of the Institute of Leaders and Managers (ILM)

Orlando Fernández is a Senior Technical Specialist at the Recovery, Resolution and Resilience team in the Prudential Policy Directorate of the Bank of England (BoE).

He has been with the BoE working on a range of policy areas for 12 years. In his current role, Orlando focuses on third-party risk management.

Orlando was one of the authors of the Prudential Regulation Authority’s (PRA) Supervisory Statement on ‘Outsourcing and third-party risk management’ (SS2/21), and the recent Consultation Paper (CP) on ‘Critical Third Parties to the Finance Sector’ issued jointly by the BoE/PRA and Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). On the international front, Orlando has represented the BoE at the European Banking Authority (EBA) expert group that produced the 2019 Guidelines on Outsourcing. He is also heavily involved in the Financial Stability Board’s ongoing work in this area, including the 2020 DP on “Regulatory and Supervisory Issues Relating to Outsourcing and Third-Party Relationships” and the toolkit for financial authorities and financial institutions as well as service providers for their third-party risk management and oversight published in 2023.

Marina is a financial regulation specialist with extensive experience of advising a wide range of financial services clients including investment banks, broker-dealers, private and retail banks and asset managers.

Marina covers a broad spectrum of regulatory issues including conduct of business, governance, licensing, restructuring, multi-jurisdictional compliance and regulatory considerations arising in the context of corporate transactions.

Marina has supported clients with large scale regulatory change implementation projects such as MiFID II, Brexit and Ringfencing. She has also more recently helped clients navigate the complex landscapes of CSDR and Sustainable Finance/ESG. Marina has also worked with industry trade associations on topics such as MiFID and CSDR.

• ESG – advising a number of global investment banks on various aspect of sustainable finance developments including in identifying the impact on their global groups
• CSDR – advising a number of financial institutions on their implementation of CSDR and working with industry trade associations to develop model contractual provisions to be included by the industry in client agreements
• Intermediate Parent Undertaking (IPU) – advising a global banking group on its implementation of the IPU requirements
• Brexit – acting as strategic advisor on the Brexit projects of two global investment banks including on intra-group arrangements, booking models and licensing analysis
• Ringfencing – advising a leading UK retail bank on its ringfencing restructuring and assisting with defining its ringfencing perimeter
• MiFID II – advising two global investment banks on their MiFID II implementation projects, including impact assessment and analysis on complex interpretational issues.

Simon is the Advisory Director at Square 4 and supports firms across financial services with regulatory change; risk management; governance and controls design and implementation; strategy, policy and process development.

Simon has a wealth of experience leading advisory teams across all financial services verticals and has led and implemented various significant regulatory change projects.

Naresh works at RSM to lead the FCA Technical Desk and his role involves assisting the teams by providing technical support on various FCA reporting engagements, with particular focus on CASS. Naresh leads various other initiatives surrounding the quality and delivery on CASS engagements.

Prior to joining RSM, Naresh worked with a few other professional services firms, including Big4. With a background in investment management audit, for the past several years, he has worked solely in CASS space providing audit, assurance and consulting services to market participants in the investment sector. His clients have included CASS large wealth managers, third party administrators and custodians, Model A and B firms, traditional brokerage houses and investment platforms.

Naresh has also worked on several CASS s166 engagements and has liaised with the regulator directly. Naresh has made active contributions to relevant industry and regulatory groups and liaised with the FCA on CASS topical matters.

Maja joined PIMFA as Senior Policy Adviser, EU and Government Affairs in November 2018. She is a former diplomat, public affairs and policy official with extensive experience of international, European and UK government and policy operations.

At PIMFA, Maja is responsible for developing policy and implementing the associated advocacy work with key EU and UK institutions, including the European Commission, Parliament, and Council, HMG, and the FCA, on a range of European and UK legislative and regulatory issues.

Prior to PIMFA, Maja worked at the City of London Corporation as an European Policy and European Regulation Adviser, focusing on Brexit related issues and on strengthening the dialogue between the UK-based financial and professional services industry, the UK government, regulatory authorities, EU institutions and Member States. While in the diplomatic service, Maja worked on numerous policy initiatives, engagement strategies and advocacy efforts, including Croatia’s negotiations for membership of the EU and NATO.

Maja was educated at the University of Zagreb, Croatia.

Beth joined Walker Crips in January 2023 and is the Compliance Advisory Manager. Beth leads the delivery and management of Compliance Advisory operations to the business, which includes leading the interpretation and impact analysis of the regulatory rules and requirements. She is also a member of the Consumer Duty Committee and Vulnerable Clients Committee within the firm.

Before working with Walker Crips, Beth worked in compliance consulting, and provided guidance and audits to a variety of different financial firms. She has 10 years experience working in the financial services industry.

Kameka is Head of Human Resources (“HR”) at Walker Crips Group and founder of Let’s Talk Diversity and Inclusion (“LTDI”). She has extensive HR experience, particularly in diversity, equity and inclusion (“DE&I”), recruitment, conflict resolution, change management, employee relations, learning development, and employer of choice initiatives. Kameka is commercially savvy and has experience of collaborating with senior management to conduct strategic HR planning to boost corporate goals and reaffirm HR best practices within DE&I initiatives.

Kameka has a proven track record of successfully implementing DE&I strategies, ensuring better representation from various groups within organisations. This achievement stems from addressing strategic plans for talent acquisition, retention, succession planning, as well as learning and development initiatives. Additionally, Kameka has led projects spanning organisational transformation and programme design to company acquisitions, from due diligence to ‘TUPE’ transfer. This showcases her exceptional communication skills, adept analysis and the ability to establish trust-based working relationships.

Outside of work, Kameka is actively involved and passionate about supporting youths and those suffering from mental health, through her role as a committee member of the YMCA. Kameka is involved in speaking at seminars to promote DE&I initiatives and to also empower women who are vulnerable within society. She mentors them in developing interview techniques and assists with CV writing to help gain employment.

David joined Brooks Macdonald in 2017 and supports and develops intermediary relationships throughout the UK. He is also a key member of our Vulnerable Client Working Group and is responsible for promoting the best routes to financial advice for vulnerable individuals.

Prior to joining Brooks Macdonald, David worked as an Investment Consultant, and at Aviva UK Life and Pensions as a Sales Consultant. He has over 25 years’ experience working in sales in the financial services industry.

After over 8 years heading up Ops Tax and other Regulatory Operations for leading retail stockbrokers in the UK,

Natalie has spent the past few years in the professional services world, expanding her experience into all types and sizes of Financial Institution in the UK and EU.

Her extensive practical experience combined with regulatory knowledge provides the perfect background for assisting clients to truly understand their regulatory requirements, implement and change them in an efficient and cost-effective manner, and providing simple technology solutions for all aspects of the regimes.

Natalie feels just as comfortable rolling her sleeves up and showing clients how the ground level work is done, as she is presenting findings and recommendations to exec level stakeholders. To set up a meeting with Natalie and find out how she can help your Ops Tax efforts to be as efficient as possible, click here.

Kevin Sloane has worked in financial services for over 40 years.
His areas of interest and expertise are wealth management operations and technology.

Kevin is a Chartered Member of the Chartered Institute of Securities and Investment and is a member of the CISI’s Wealth Management Forum Committee.

Rachel was appointed Ombudsman Director for Insurance in January 2023. She leads a directorate responsible for all insurance complaints at the Financial Ombudsman Service as well as drawing out the themes and insight to share with the sector. She works with Ombudsman Leaders to form the Ombudsman’s approach on insurance complaints, building teams to handle these well and with pace. This includes complaints across home and motor insurance, travel, health, pet and legal expenses.

Rachel has been at the Financial Ombudsman Service for 12 years, working across insurance for the past seven and before then leading transformation at the service. Previously Rachel worked in government and across a range of policy roles at the Home Office, Department of Education and Department for Work and Pensions.

Alex joined PIMFA in June 2017 as a Policy Adviser, where she works on a wide range of regulatory matters, engaging with policy makers and the regulator to promote members’ interests.

She previously worked for the Association of Professional Financial Advisers (APFA) in the same capacity. APFA merged with the Wealth Management Association (WMA) to form PIMFA.

Alex has a legal background, having studied law at Cambridge University and was called to the Bar in 1997. She was a tenant at Lamb Chambers, Temple where she specialised in personal injury claims, contractual disputes and professional negligence. Alex has experience of advisory, drafting and court work including appearances in the Court of Appeal, the High Court and county courts.