Leaders in Motion Women Driving Financial Innovation

Thank you. Hello everyone. I'm not quite sure how we're going to uh follow that session. Um the uh analogy to the uh to the ministry was absolutely fantastic. Very well done.

Um my panel today I'm pleased to be here with and each of you ladies leads innovation from a different vantage point. So market infrastructure, fintech, intelligence and global institutional banking. Uh perhaps we could just take this time to do a quick introduction and share how your perspective has shaped what you see as the biggest shift coming to finance in the next few years. Nadine, we'll start with you.

So good afternoon. My name is Nadine Shakar. I lead the digital uh products at DTCC. Uh just as a matter of introduction, DTCC is the largest depository in the world and the uh depository for the US markets. Do you want me to go further or

Yeah, please. What's the biggest shift coming to finance?

So what we're working on right now is to uh assist if you will with the tokenization of the US markets. Uh DTCC custodies about a hundred trillion dollars in US markets. Here we go. Thank you. Um and we also settle up to four quadrillion dollars a year uh in settlement.

So very large numbers and we believe that if we can innovate in tokenize these markets uh that will make it a major boost if you will for finally bringing finance um onchain and modernizing the way we uh we create we consume uh financial products. So thank you for having me today.

And how many zeros are in a quadrillion? I was gonna ask the audience that, but I remember uh the first the first time I read it, I did have to Google it and it's 15 zeros.

Wow. [laughter] Okay, great to know. Thank you, Seni.

Um, thanks for having me. I'm Senidi Parson. I'm the founder and group CEO of Fin Street Limited. and Fin Street Limited is building what I believe to be the first-in-class digital market infrastructure that spans issuance, custody, trading and settlement across private, global private and public market assets. Um, and I believe that the next shift in the in the market is going to be that capital needs to be global and that there's going to be no difference between the interoperability between private market assets, public market assets.

Um, and it's not just comparing crypto with the traditional finance. is allowing for um the various strategies of assets alongside digital assets to operate on a digital rail as well as on one infrastructure.

Perfect. And Isha,

well, first of all, congratulations to those who've made it to day four. I think it's been a hectic week. So, I'm really pleased to see everyone has who has made it and thank you for your generous time. Um, my name is Isha Isha Chander and I'm with JP Morgan Payments. I cover the Sema region for the for the bank uh for payment specifically and look at driving growth as well as transformation as the chief administrative officer.

I think the biggest shift and and this has been a topic throughout the week and we've all talked about AI a lot. Um over the last 18 months, companies of all shapes and sizes have been experimenting with AI, what it can do, looking under the hood, thinking about different things they can do. But I think over the next two years what's really going to pan out is the need to develop use cases because I think there will be pressure across the board from the boards themselves on on the leadership on what what when can you deliver results with this thing called AI. I think it is still a bit of a mystery as much as everyone thinks they understand it. Um and I think people will will need to realize that at the end of the day it's not just AI that can deliver benefits.

is also using technology in a smarter way. I was talking to a couple of treasurers yesterday at our clients and they're not just thinking about AI. They're even just thinking about how to use their ERP systems, how can they use macros and Excel to deliver better outcomes. So I think we need to get very use case oriented on AI and and we definitely will see that shift. So I'm hoping in two years time, Gina, we're talking about these are the five, you know, best use cases in the world of financial services and specifically payments.

I definitely feel that with AI across this week, it's been really difficult to pinpoint some of those real life use cases. Um, less so though in the tokenization market where we have a lot of real life use cases going on. Um, Naen, I'm just going to spend a couple of minutes with you and the DTCC right now reshaping the backbone of financial markets. Um, as tokenization and digital assets are maturing, uh, what perspectives do you think a diverse leadership brings to decisions around building trust and resilience into global market infrastructure?

That's a that's a great question. Um, and I believe at this point I I don't know if it's maturing, but um, it's it's moving forward in the right way. We're starting to get uh, more clarity from a regulatory perspective, and this is no longer a technology issue. I think we've cracked the technology. We know it works.

Um but the thing that you said it is right now all about governance and trust. Um and it's um you know on um and this is where diversity comes in in in a big way. You need diversity of thought. Um and what we're doing also in this um in in this environment. So when you're a financial services company, DTCC is on the extreme of that.

We tend to be highly regulated. uh we've got systems that go back decades. You've got people uh that have been there for a long period of time. And what you do see is sometimes a culture clash between like this is good, leave it, don't break something that works or you've got the anxiety of like hold on, there's a fear of missing out. The world is changing.

We need to to to jump on that bandwagon. And then if you're a regulated institution, you're sort of stuck in the middle because you aspire to lead. you aspire to change the world, but you're limited with with what you have now. In the US, we've seen a massive shift these past 18 months with now our regulators really moving and partnering with the industry, if you will, to try to try to move forward. Uh, but the um and it's funny, I was think we're sitting next to you and I was I was laughing when the question around the Minister of Education, right?

So, and and I was in another session yesterday which same thing. They want people to go on and learn applied applied physics and applied math and applied this. But at the end of the day, we forgot the art of communicating. We forgot the art of negotiating uh and the art of bringing people together. And and that is why diversity is really really important in this.

Um and it's all about right now making sure that we've got the right governance, the right trust. Yes, we work in a trustless environment, but at the heart of it, uh smart contracts don't look good in orange, which is, you know, you still need uh you still need to hold somebody accountable because we're dealing with institutional money. And this is where you have generational shift where if it's my money, I'll go on any DeFi uh avenue. I'll do whatever I want to do. But when I'm responsible for somebody else's money, uh then it's more institutional DeFi.

And that's where trust and governance uh comes in. So I think you're going to start seeing a shift and and I agree with the use cases, but personally I'm sort of over the use cases. I I we we need to start to execute. We need to start shipping products uh that are ready for consumption. They may not be great.

Uh and it's okay. We can iterate. We can get there. I mean the financial markets uh that we're working on and especially, you know, being from this region as well, they've been thousands of years in in in existence. We've been we've been bartering and and doing different things.

Funny enough, when you go back to what we're doing today in DeFi, we're we're back to the future to a certain extent. Let's go out. Let's experiment. Let's put the products out. Um but once there's trust in governance, I think we can we can make them work.

You've kind of also answered my next question as well, but let's see. Um where do you see the greatest disconnect between aspiration and execution when institutions try to modernize and how do leaders close that gap? Is it just a case of getting out there and getting on with it?

I think it goes back to also cultural in that generational gap, right? So, we all talk a good game. We want to innovate. Uh we, you know, just go out and don't worry about it. Failure is great.

If you haven't failed, uh you haven't lived. If you guys work in any large institutions, tell me the last time any of you got rewarded for messing something up, breaking something. Right? So there is definitely a disconnect between the aspiration which is we want to be the best, we want to be innovative and unfortunately the realities of where we deal with today. Um and if you're a publicly traded company, it's even worse, right?

Uh you don't have the money to wait three, four, five years to for something to uh come come together. You tend to put KPIs for today, not for tomorrow. um you tend to look at everything from a risk uh based lens. Some of the things we're dealing with today, there's just no roadmap, right? Where we're we're figuring out as we go along.

What I love about this is it's really a community work. It's a work of love. Like it takes a village. We look at this. I I managed to put three uh three three sayings in one sentence, but it it truly is.

Um so, and that is where the disconnect is. it's it's where you want to be, but then you're faced with the realities of tomorrow. Um, and the way to get over that is really start to build a culture uh that is more forgiving uh that's more understanding um and try to try to move it forward. But I don't know about you guys, the last time I messed up, I'm I'm pretty sure I didn't get a raise out of it. So, that's where it goes.

Be more forgiving.

Be more forgiving. [laughter] Um and Snoody from your vantage point analyzing fintech and emerging markets what trends are you seeing that are bringing together those larger players um where even regulators are still underestimating?

I think there are a lot of inefficiencies in the market and the regulators or the institutions are starting to see that. Um I honestly believe that tokenization um or in the future AI um you know AI sorry tokenization blockchain is not necessarily an experiment today. There is evidence that the large industry players are properly picking it up. You see for example our partners Blackrock and Franklin Templeton have already done tokenized money market funds and there's others um asset managers that have at least tens of billions of assets on chain and in 2030 it's already projected to be at least 1 trillion if not more. Um secondly that private markets that are already 20 trillion AUM are still analog and you know the fact that there is at least 1 trillion of assets that's looking for maturity that's looking for exit and there is no one infrastructure other than just providing continuation vehicles for various investors to exit is not a scalable solution and you know the fact that these products are um you distinguished between strategies and geographies is not necessarily uh strategic but operational honestly.

Um so I think that uh market infrastructure is going to help in that immensely. And thirdly and uniquely actually the west has long um you know run the various uh infrastructures and regulation and trust and governance around that. And because of that the emerging markets have now come to become structurally advantaged because as also Nadine mentioned there is no legacy system that they are you know um withheld by as well as they are able to learn lessons from the various inefficiencies that are being placed or uh identified with the market today and thus um you know they have the ability to rearchitect on first principles. And we've talked a lot on this stage today about those soft skills that a lot of us have wearing the many caps that we all do. Um, fintech often succeeds because it sees human behavior differently.

In your view, how can wider industry players adopt that mindset to build more inclusive and efficient financial systems? Well, I think that what we've learned from the various um fintech uh disruption or innovation or successes so far is that um the systems cannot hold human behavior. And so FinTech what they're doing is they are leveraging on um you know what the humans or the clients or the market is expecting delivering on that and soon the institutions that are big uh tend to lose their position and so I think that in order to stay inclusive uh there's uh two things one for the big institution large institutions to maintain their position should be open to adapting and open to recognizing the inefficiencies as well as not try to retrofit everything into their own legacy system. Sometimes you know disruption or innovation requires proper change and um you know secondly for the regulators as well um there needs to be some level of harmonization that capital is capital it's global it doesn't matter whe the capital sits in the US or in Africa it fundamentally is what it is and so the fact that there is each regulator that has their own set of definitions process and the way of expecting the participants to do certain things. Um if there is an open dialogue for um the regulators and the market builders as well as uh for the regulators to come and harmonize together will um go long term.

We'll all live in harmony. [laughter] Um Isha JP Morgan is transforming how global payments and digital infrastructure operates. What capabilities or technologies do you believe will most redefine how banks compete in the next five years? I think within the transaction banking space, payment space and I think my answer is quite simple. It's real-time payments and settlement.

Um crossber payments continue to be extremely complex with with a very very long chain. Um it's expensive. It is uh it's cumbersome at times and I think overall there's a lot of investment that's going in especially uh JP Morgan to try and make crossber payments as easy as possible. At the end of the day there the market is demanding that there's an expectation that we are able to deliver it and there's a lot of investment that we've made in our Kexus platform as well onchain 24 by7 365 uh days a year payments and you know I think over the next five years uh whoever is making crosswater payments very easy will have a competitive advantage um and it's it's a space that's worth watching

in terms of innovation um it really only works when talent and culture supports it. You mentioned the big institutions earlier making mistakes, Naen, but for for you is what do you think uh actually accelerates innovation inside these big institutions and what slows it down?

Yeah, and I'll touch on some of the stuff you said I completely agree. I think um when you talk about innovation, the normal paralans, you know, oh well, you need to be allowing failure, but how do you actually do that in larger organizations? It's it's it's it's difficult especially because I don't think there's still a definition of what responsible respon how do you fail responsibly right and how do you actually create a test and learn so that you don't actually let get into a into a position where people are fail you know one individual is failing it is an actual test environment which enables um the the uh option to actually try all different things and and and learn from it but at the end of the day I think in larger inst institutions what works is leadership commitment and vision. When leadership steps in sets ambitious goals and agenda that is the biggest statement but you have to put you know your money where your mouth is. So then you have to allocate the necessary resources as well because that's when you really really are, you know, being getting serious about innovation, right?

And I think that's one thing I'm proud of working at JP Morgan because I think we we practice that it's not easy. It's it's hard to innovate in larger organizations. I think you touched on some of the legacy systems, right? We are dealing with you are literally building the plane as you're flying it and you cannot mess anything, right? So I think that that always is is a is a challenge.

I think the previous panel touched a lot on diverse opinions and diverse point of views. I think that is very important. In larger organizations, it's very easy to get into an echo chamber just because of the way organizations are. So, making sure that you at any given point in time have a diverse point of view. I know it sounds obvious, we all talk about it, but how well do you actually execute on this is really important.

Again, the tone has to be set from the top. I think these are some of the few things I would say um are very important. I love it. Um I even loved that one of the ladies from previously changed her whole career path based on some of the questions that she was asking herself. So I think sometimes it's nice to be introspective.

Um this session though is called leaders in motion because influence is clearly shifting in finance. For all three of you where do you see the greatest opportunities for new voices and not just new companies to shape what comes next? Nine we'll start with you. really across the board. I mean, we're we're rebuilding everything uh in a way from scratch, but also being very responsible and uh thoughtful, if you will, to ensure that we're we're we're salvaging some of the uh traditional way of doing things because it is really hard when you're like in our situation or in JP Morgan.

Um if we stumble, the consequences are huge, right? So, u you're absolutely right. that fintech has got the u um has got the you know the the flexibility if you will to hone in on something very specific and do it extremely well. Um and that's how you grow and you prosper. For us, we're in a slightly different boat where we've got to make sure that and I think you said it, you're fixing the plane as you fly it.

So we have to be very mindful of unintended consequences and where the voices come in is at all sorts. It's in government, it's in regulation, it's in the boardrooms. Uh because I fully agree. Um and we've been successful at DTCC because our CEO, our executive management, our board um are committed uh to uh to making sure that we can reshape uh US financial markets. But you can't do that if you don't have the regulators on board, you don't have uh your investors on board, you know, your teams, right?

Like um that that's that's a lot of change in your client base. Uh, everybody wants to innovate until they realize how hard it is. Uh, especially in the work that we do. Give you a very simple example. If you're a fund manager or you're a bank and you manage your middle or back office, you've already plucked in millions if not billions of dollars over the years building that technology and a very simple change, right?

We're moving from accountbased, right? We've got account brokerage accounts. We've got bank accounts. We've got this accounts. And now they're all being replaced by a wallet.

Think through if you're at JP Morgan, you're at DTCC, you're in any bank, any fund manager, right? The disruption that cause in the in the machinery that operates the middle in the back office, right? That becomes hard. So, you need people from all walks of life to really engage. And listen, it's hard.

It's hard work, but if you believe in it and you believe in the goodness that it will uh provide for the next decades to come, I think we can get people to rally around that vision.

Thank you.

I think of course um already mentioned that um there's global capital flows and global strategies that need to become lot more fluid and crossborder. So I think just stepping aside from that one thing that I one um infrastructure uh or market that I personally find very intriguing other than you know what we are building is um prediction markets and I believe that how expectations are priced and how this market will transform or evolve in the future where economists or data scientists will start ascribing their risk to uh measure policy inflation etc is actually very intriguing and interesting as an and a new domain where I am watching out for the voice.

Lovely.

Um I think that nothing more I think you covered a lot of ground that I was going to say. I think the regulation the regulator side is very important from a transaction banking perspective. We're also seeing that you can you need more prominent technology voice as well. I think when technology and product organizations work together in banking, especially on the payments end, you can build much better client experiences as well. Um, and I think you can also move faster.

So I think that that partnership between those two organizations is really important. Um, client experience is something that has been in the retail con in the context quite prominent, right? we all still go to our our preferred marketplace probably not just because of price but also because of the client experience and I think in the B2B space we're yet to see that revolution come and we take client experience very very seriously and I think in that in that process you need that diverse point of view and you need technology right with product as well as a whole host of other uh candidates to kind of drive that change regulators you know as I said I completely agree I think um we're fortunate to be in ADGM ourselves as a cat one license holder and I think ADGM themselves are very very progressive and I think the more progressive regulators are that will determine the competitiveness of those countries those markets as well. else I think it's it's going to be quite interesting as regulators really play on the front foot

and it's a nice segue actually to leadership um I would love to ask what is one assumption about leadership in finance that you think is outdated and what is replacing it and we'll come back this way

I think we've probably covered a little bit of this leadership can sometimes be seen as managing risk by avoiding failure um whereas Whereas I think that that's quite outdated. Um you can't be covering your backside for a lack of a better phrase. You need to think about as a leader how are you creating a space where your you know your staff your people are able to uh come up with the right ideas and at and also the best ideas what's also outdated is the best ideas don't come from the top. um you know be open-minded let let the right ideas bubble up from all the way you know from uh from the younger population entering your organizations as well I think that that's really important to build those constructs

so I think in finance um leadership is no longer defined on um proper certainty or knowing it all or a sense of hierarchy I think that um leadership and finance u means that there is somebody um who can look systems holistically who can question the status quo to create value of course not just for the sake of doing that um and I think overall it's not about being a commander it's not about directing people I honestly think leadership is also about mastering oneself so that then you become you know um you start gaining respect of other people and then you truly become a leader

I I I think if you go back uh leaders made it to the seauite by specializing in one thing. Um and it's very much building on the themes you've heard. So you're good in finance. You were the CFO, you become the CEO or it's very rare to see somebody who was head of strategy become CEO or head of product become CEO. So I would say a couple of things is leaders today need to be u um have a there's a vulnerability there.

It's okay not to know all the answers. Things are moving too fast uh for you to be omniresent be the oracle that has all all the answers. So relying on the team um the command and control environment of yesterday just doesn't work. It's a new generation of kids that are actually making the difference. Like we've we've been fortunate we've been in AGM now for about 10 years.

And when we when we were bought by DTCC, I had to run around and tell the guys like, "You can't run around wearing shorts and flip-flops anymore. Just wear t-shirts and wear wear jeans and tennis shoes, right?" So, it's it's a it's a halfway compromise. Uh, but it's still um it's it's still a change, but that is the change we needed. So, I would say compassion, passion, vision is what we need from our leaders today.

Um, and um and really not being afraid, if you will, of the unknown. And I think perhaps as well um you know as a as young people we're often forced to pick a direction and stick with it. But what I'm seeing when I'm talking to people at this event is that there are the ability to change now. You don't have to go into technology and stick there. You can be strategic.

Versa you have to.

All right. I want to do a lightning question before we get to our final question. But if you could redesign one part of the financial system to unlock innovation access, what would it be and why? Well, I'd like to think we're doing it right now, which is tokenizing the US markets and uh and I think that would unlock a lot uh not just for the US uh but for the world um in general. You you talk a lot about cap capital mobility.

That's what it's going to provide. The ability of being able to move collateral at the speed of the network uh will free up an incredible amount of of of capital um payments, right? So, it's going to be and we've all grown up into it. You guys are all on your phones right now. Like the access to instantaneous information, right?

That's that's you don't need to wait now 24 hours to move your money or wait a day uh to get access uh to your sec. You shouldn't even have to sell uh your instruments to get access to money. So, but it starts in my mind with um unblocking the um that that capital which I view it in form of tokenization. We need to strengthen the infrastructure. We're talking about trillions of dollars and today for as much progress that we've made.

There's still nothing out there uh that unfortunately comes close and we need to continue to work together to get there. Those two things I know you asked for one, but you got a two for one today.

The last day

to to be able to get that done.

So, um sorry, Gina, can you

Yes, I'll repeat the question. if you could redesign what part of the financial system to unlock innovation access.

Yes, got it. Sorry about that. So, look again the same thing for me. I I believe that we are redesigning um the system the market architecture already today and I would just like to give an example of how real that is. So when I said that private markets do not have an infrastructure to be traded and I'm saying that Fin Street has the ability to issue that custodize that settle that T plus zero and trade it what does that mean in terms of really architecting that we are creating uh first-in-class trading rules for how private markets will be traded so the fact that there can be agility flexibility and have the same strengths of the asset being private have some sort of price floors on that is how real it is when you're architecting something.

So I think and also the fact that we are partnering with Black Rockck to create such rules and getting also industry expertise from across the world to see where the inefficiencies have been and then start catering to the industry. So I think that's that's real.

Anisha slightly different question for you for the women of today. what is the one skill or mindset you think they should be thinking about right now and and how they bring that to the table?

I think um strategy is fun. I love strategy as well. I do a lot of it. But focus on the execution and no matter how senior you get, have the ability to roll your sleeves up and get into the weeds. Don't try and stay at the surface because I think things are changing and it's important that you're right in the thick of it.

Um, so don't you know that also keeps you grounded and humble. Um, so I'd say f make sure your execution is impeccable because it's only as good as your strategy then, right? So you have to make your strategy look good by really executing well against it.

Amazing. Well, thank you so much. I've learned so much from this session. Appreciate all of you joining us today. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.