FMI and fintech: oversight and innovation in payments and settlements 2023

Clair Mills is the Director of Strategic Change and Operations for the Markets, Banking and Payments Deputy Governorship, at the Bank of England, and is responsible for middle and back office operations, which includes delivery of the Markets, Banking and Payments Operations and Data Strategy, Budget, Operational Resilience and Risk and the Investment and Change Portfolio. Clair has over 20 years’ extensive financial services experience operating at board level and leading successful strategic and transformational change in a number of complex organisations, having started her career in the Building Society and Retail Banking sector, before moving into Operational and Technological Change Management and Consultancy. Clair joined the Financial Services Authority in 2011 to lead the Internal Twin Peaks programme transition to the PRA and FCA regulatory model, moving across to the Bank of England with the PRA becoming the Chief Operating Officer in the PRA in 2018. In her current role, as well as providing the leadership, management and vision necessary to support the business and to ensure that the proper operational controls, administrative and reporting procedures, and people systems are in place, Clair is also responsible for leading the area’s extensive project portfolio, helping translate business and policy vision into deliverable change programmes, this includes giving key note speeches both in the UK and internationally on topics such as Financial and Regulatory Technology (FinTech/RegTech) and how Central Banks and regulators can take advantage of the advances in technology in the work we do.

Patrick Papsdorf is Head of Section of Payments Oversight in the Directorate General Payments and Market Infrastructure (DG-MIP) at the European Central Bank (ECB). His area of responsibility comprises the oversight of payment systems and schemes, and encompasses the assessment of emerging risks and developments in the payments ecosystem, including aspects cyber resilience and financial innovation. Prior to this, Mr Papsdorf was Adviser to DG-MIP's Market Infrastructure Management Division, where he was in charge of analytical and compliance matters, and contributed to the operations and development of key market infrastructures.

Earlier positions include a commercial bank, the Deutsche Bundesbank and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Mr Papsdorf holds the German recognition as bank officer, a bachelor's degree in business management from the University of the Deutsche Bundesbank and a master in global management.

Kwame Oppong is the Head of Fintech and Innovation at Bank of Ghana.
His background spans Technology, Digital Financial Services (DFS) operations, policy development, and regulation. He has consulted for several governments, public sector institutions, international development organizations and private corporations globally.
Prior to joining the Bank, Kwame worked with CGAP (World Bank Group), Millicom, Hewlett Packard (now HP EB) and other organizations in the banking, housing finance and health insurance industries.
He is a passionate advocate for financial inclusion, innovation, and the development of digital economies.

Vasilis Papaefthymiou is a supervisory technologies analyst specialising in the development of Natural Language Processing (NLP) applications and leading transformative projects and initiatives in this domain. Since joining the European Central Bank in 2019, Vasilis has developed a diverse range of supervisory content expertise and has contributed to various stages of innovative IT project development. Previous assignments at the ECB included managing and analysing large datasets of fintech companies and crypto-assets exchanges. Vasilis is an electrical and computer engineer with a specialisation in computer science and the management of information systems and prior to the ECB, he has worked in a tech company and research projects.

Adolfo Sarmiento is Head of Economic Policy and Markets, advising to the board at the Central Bank of Uruguay, he is responsible for the Monetary Policy implementation, and he’s also involved in FinTech specially in the CBDC Projects. He holds a degree in Economics of the University of the Republic of Uruguay, a Master in Applied Macroeconomics of the Catholic University of Chile and a PhD in Economics for the Catholic University of Argentina.

Peter Faykiss is the Director of Digitalization Directorate at the Magyar Nemzeti Bank (the central bank of Hungary), where he is responsible for FinTech, digital finance and digital currencies/CBDC topics. Before entering the digital finance area, he gained experience in financial stability, financial regulation and macroprudential policy. As the Head of Division for Banking Regulations of Ministry for National Economy he was responsible for the domestic implementation of the European regulatory package CRD IV in 2013. In 2014 he was appointed as the Head of Macroprudential Policy Department of the MNB, from 2017 he served as the Director of Macroprudential Directorate. Mr. Faykiss graduated in 2009 from Corvinus University of Budapest and he holds a PhD in Finance from Corvinus University of Budapest.”