The Middle East and Africa FinTech Forum has announced that a large number of central bank governors from the Mena region will attend the 3rd annual FinTech Forum, which will be held in Manama under the patronage of the Central Bank of Bahrain on February 21. 

 

Rasheed Al Maraj, Governor of the Central Bank of Bahrain, will inaugurate the FinTech Forum, which will also be attended by senior officials from the central banks of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the UAE, Bahrain, Oman, Jordan, Egypt, Libya and Tunisia.

 

The forum, which is hosted by Bank ABC and Arab Financial Services, brings together internationally-renowned thought leaders, practitioners and innovators from the FinTech and artificial intelligence (AI) arenas to discuss a wide range of issues including the future of banking, the potential impact of AI and how it will transform the future, open banking, crowdsourcing and financial inclusion. 

 

ABC Bank’s deputy group CEO and AFS chairman Sael Al Waary said: “Across the region, banks and other financial institutions are facing enormous disruption from technology. But change should be embraced, not feared. Technology will revolutionise the way we do business. More importantly, it will empower people across the region, and be a force for true inclusion. This forum will show us how.”

 

Speakers at the FinTech Forum include Anthony Thompson (founder of Atom Bank, Metro Bank and 86400), Brett King (founder of Moven, the mobile financial services provider), Henri Arslanian, chairman of the FinTech Association of Hong Kong, Dr Ayesha Khanna, co-founder and CEO of ADDO AI, and Pippa Malmgren, co-founder of H-Robotics.

 

Also speaking at the forum will be David Smith, chief executive of Global Futures and Foresight; Rohit Talwar, chief executive of Fast Future; and leading business innovators Dan Cobley, managing Partner of Fintech at Blenheim Chalcot; Qamar Saleem, global lead for SME and supply chain finance practice at IFC (World Bank Group); Alastair Lukies, chairman of Innovate Finance; Thomas Blood from Amazon Web Services; and Steve Kirsch, CEO of Token. – TradeArabia News Service