For financial institutions across the APAC region, Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) compliance represents one of the most fast-moving and multi-faceted of regulatory challenges, with far-reaching implications for risk and data management. This ‘heavy lift’ also offers opportunity for those able to ‘operationalise’ ESG and embed sustainability not only in its compliance and reporting practices, but also in its culture. The risks of ‘greenwashing’ are well known, but the long-term reputational benefits of delivering credible ESG-based propositions are only beginning to be realised.
In terms of its ESG regulatory framework, APAC broadly stands between Europe, the first-mover with its taxonomy, Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (SFDR) and related rules, and the United States, only just beginning to align with Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD). As APAC’s regulators ramp up their expectations, it is the perfect time for the region’s financial institutions to step up their efforts to deliver on ESG compliance and beyond to pursue commercial advantage.
This special webinar hosted by Regulation Asia and ESG Investor and supported by Fenergo seeks to uncover how financial firms can successfully operationalise ESG frameworks to manage regulatory, reputational and financial risk whilst reaping greater commercial benefits.
Rongrong Huo
Executive Director
Executive Director, Ninety One / Chair ESG Leadership Forum, UK
Prashant Joshi
GM APAC Regulatory Affairs & Projects
BNP Paribas
Edel Brophy
Global Director of Regulatory Compliance
Fenergo
Evan Lam
Partner, Financial Regulation
Ashurst
Nick Wakefield
Co-founder
ESG Investor &
Regulation Asia
(Moderator)
Ashish is a banking professional with 23 years of techno-functional experience in Transformation, Digitization, Strategy, Data, Analytics, Business Process Re-engineering, Change and Risk Management across Wealth Management, Private Banking and Consumer Banking.
Bradley is Co-Founder at Regulation Asia, the leading regulatory news intelligence service for the financial sector in APAC. Bradley advises governmental and start-up projects, including several regulated digital assets, climate markets and payments entities.
Previously Bradley oversaw Strategy with SunGard Financial Systems (now FIS), heading up strategic, business planning and product development across Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Middle East. Prior to this, he was a management consultant focused on private equity and alternative assets. He has also been involved in several high-profile research programmes, including assisting the US Treasury Department in accessing the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) instituted following the 2008 global financial crisis.
Bradley is a senior Financial Regulation and Risk Management research fellow with The Guangzhou-Nottingham Advanced Institute of Finance and the Guangzhou University of Finance’s Institute of Financial Employment.
Focused on the broader economic impact of financial regulation, he holds Master’s degrees in Finance, Quantitative Research and Law from New York University’s Stern School of Business, the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, and the University of Melbourne. He is currently a doctoral candidate at the Swiss Business School in Zurich.
Parsa Khoshdel is an accomplished management consulting professional with more than 11 years of experience in private banking and financial services consulting.
He has extensive experience in driving large scale regulatory business transformation programs in collaboration with leading global financial institutions.
Parsa holds a Masters degree in Financial Engineering from National University of Singapore and is currently leading the PBWM Regulatory Compliance and Risk Management division for Synpulse in APAC.
Jane is a highly motivated and accomplished professional with over a decade of experience in the financial services sector. Beginning her career as a practicing lawyer in Malaysia, she later transitioned to the financial services industry where she assumed responsibility for overseeing regulatory compliance and risk management.
Prior to her current role at Charles Monat Associates, Jane served as the Head of Compliance at both AAM Advisory and St. James’s Place Singapore, where she established robust policies and standards that were successfully integrated throughout the organisations.
Throughout her career, Jane has worked closely with advisors and business stakeholders to ensure that clients can easily conduct business with the firm while maintaining compliance with all regulatory requirements.
Osvaldo is a Suitability & Wealth Management SME for NICE Actimize. Prior to joining NICE, he was a Financial Consultant with Fidelity Investments, where he helped retail and HNWI clients define their financial goals and provided them with financial planning concepts and solutions to meet those goals.
Before Fidelity, Osvaldo served around ten years at TIAA, working on the institutional side of the business for four years and the Wealth Management space for around six years. During his tenure at TIAA, he was a part of projects and pilots catering specifically to DOL and Suitability changes, including regulatory requirements and user interface.
Before joining TIAA, he was a Financial Advisor with Wells Fargo Advisors for two years, responsible for the Wealth Management offering out of 5 offices. Osvaldo began his career as a Financial Advisor at Bank of America / Merrill Lynch for around seven years, where he was responsible for running a Wealth Management practice across six offices.
Osvaldo has a bachelor’s degree in Finance from New Jersey City University. He also holds a Series 7, 63, 65, and Life & Health Producers licenses from the state of New Jersey.
Mr Ken Nagatsuka is the Executive Director and Head of Payments Department at the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS). The department is responsible for the authorisation, ongoing supervision and policy-making in relation to payment systems and payment service providers, such as e-money issuers, remittance providers and digital payment token (more commonly known as cryptocurrency) service providers under the Payments Services Act.
Prior to this, Mr Nagatsuka has worked in the field of capital markets regulation for over 15 years, and was previously Head of the Capital Markets Policy Division responsible for policy formulation and reviewing legislation in relation to capital markets and market infrastructures. In his role, he represented MAS on various international committees under the FSB, CPMI and IOSCO, on subjects such as OTC derivatives reforms and financial market infrastructures. Prior to that, he also served in various roles in exchange and clearing house supervisory functions.
Mr Nagatsuka holds both a Bachelor of Business Management and Bachelor of Science in Economics from the Singapore Management University.
Ari Redbord is Head of Legal and Government Affairs at TRM Labs, a blockchain analytics company. Prior to joining TRM Labs, he served as a Senior Advisor to the Deputy Secretary and the Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence at the United States Department of Treasury. In this capacity, he worked with teams from the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), and other Treasury and interagency components on issues related to sanctions, the Bank Secrecy Act, cryptocurrency, and anti-money laundering strategies.
Previously, Mr. Redbord served as a Senior Assistant United States Attorney for the District of Columbia, where he investigated and prosecuted cases related to cryptocurrency, terrorist financing, sanctions evasion, export control, child exploitation and human trafficking. He has received numerous awards from FinCEN, the FBI, and the United States Attorney’s Office, including the Attorney General’s Award for leading an interagency task force dedicated to prosecuting those who abuse and exploit children.