Peter Simon is the Managing Director of WSBI-ESBG. Mr. Simon, born and raised in Mannheim, graduated in 1995 in law from the Ruprecht-Karls-University in Heidelberg. Following his studies, he started to work as lawyer at the legal affairs office of the city of Mannheim. In 1996 he became personal and legal adviser to the First Mayor and in 1999 head of the European Affairs Office of the City of Mannheim. In 2007 he became head of the Economic Development department of the Metropolitan Region Rhine-Neckar GmbH. Mr. Simon held this position until his election in the European Parliament in 2009. As an MEP, he was active as Vice-Chairman of the ECON Committee and was Rapporteur for the CRD V/CRR II and Deposit Guarantee Schemes. After his second term in the European Parliament, he became in 2020 DSGV Plenipotentiary to the European Union and since January 2021 he is Managing Director of WSBI-ESBG. On January 2023, he was elected as the Chair of the European Banking Industry Committee (EBIC) which represents the whole banking industry, including the European Banking Federation and the European Association of Co-operative Banks

David Lukáš Rozumek is Senior Financial Sector Expert at the IMF, International Monetary Fund. He has participated in a range of missions focusing on banking supervision. David specializes on the climate environmental risk agenda and represents the IMF in the BCBS Task Force on Climate Related Financial Risks (TFCR) and contributes to the work of the NGFS. David is an expert in supervision and regulation, with more than 20 years of experience. Between 2008 and 2017, he was managing Financial Supervision Department of the Czech National Bank. David was elected twice a member of the EBA Management Board and was also co-chairing the EBA Standing Committee on Regulation and Policy (SCRePol).

Marcel Haag is Director Horizontal Policies  at DG FISMA at the European Commission Marcel Haag studied law at the universities of Freiburg, Bonn, Strasbourg and at the EUI in Florence and qualified as a judge in Düsseldorf. After a short stint in business, he joined the European Commission and worked in different services within the Commission. Until the summer of 2020, Mr. Haag served as a Director for policy coordination in the Secretariat-General of the Commission. He is currently Director for Horizontal policies at the Directorate-General for Financial Stability, Financial Services and Capital Markets Union (DG FSMA), European Commission.

In April  2023 Philip List (55) has been appointed as managing director of Erste Social Finance Holding (FLiP has been incorporated as a non profit limited company) 
In October 2015 he  has been appointed director of the Erste Financial Life Park (FLiP). FLiP main objective is to promote the responsible handling of money, as well as knowledge about financial & economical coherencies. Fighting youth indebtness is one of the key motives. FLiP is the the biggest financial education initiative in the CEE region.
Philip  has gained a lot of experience in the past few years in diverse lead management positions within Erste Group.
From 2009 to October 2015 he was CMO of Erste Group Bank AG and has a degree in law from Karl-Franzens University in Graz Austria.

Marcel Haag is Director Horizontal Policies , DG FISMA at the European Commission. He studied law at the universities of Freiburg, Bonn, Strasbourg and at the EUI in Florence and qualified as a judge in Düsseldorf. After a short stint in business, he joined the European Commission and worked in different services within the Commission. Until the summer of 2020, Mr. Haag served as a Director for policy coordination in the Secretariat-General of the Commission. He is currently Director for Horizontal policies at the Directorate-General for Financial Stability, Financial Services and Capital Markets Union (DG FSMA), European Commission.

Evert Van Walsum, Head of the Investor Protection and Sustainable Finance Departmentstarted his career in banking in the Netherlands. After that period, he continued his career in supervision and regulation at the Netherlands Authority for the Financial Markets (AFM), where he worked in various roles as a policy officer and as supervisor, in the markets area and in the field of consumer protection. His last position at the AFM was head of the Capital Markets Division.At ESMA, Evert is Head of the Investor Protection and Sustainable Finance Department, responsible for the areas of sustainability, investor protection, asset management, corporate finance and corporate reporting. Evert has studied at the University of Amsterdam and at INSEAD Fontainebleau.

Christian E. Castro was appointed Head of Public Affairs at Caixabank in 2021. He started his career in 2000 at the  Banco Central de la República Argentina as an Economist. Following this, he worked for the Inter-American Development Bank in Washington DC as a Young Professional, and in 2009 he became a PhD Economist at the Bank of England working in the Prudential Policy Division. In 2012, he joined the Bank of Spain as Senior Economist and in 2016, he was appointed Head of Division, Global Regulatroy Policy and Impact Analysis in the Regulation Department.Cristian Castro holds a PhD degree in Business Economics from UAB

Ondřej Kovařík has spent his career so far in the Czech and European public administration, whether at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Government Office, the Embassy of the Czech Republic in Canada, the Ministry of Defense or the European Parliament. Since 2019, he has been exercising the mandate of a member of the EP elected in the Czech Republic. He is a member of several parliamentary committees, where he deals with, among other things, EU economic policy with a focus on small and medium-sized enterprises, digital finance, tourism, the transport sector, as well as the use and development of new technologies such as artificial intelligence.

Peter Kerstens is Advisor on Technological Innovation and Cybersecurity at the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Financial Stability, Financial Services and Capital Markets Union. He has led work on the European Commission’s Fintech Action Plan. He has extensive experience in EU policy and legislation covering financial services and single market policy and regulation, electronic commerce and payments, health and consumer protection. Prior to his current position Peter covered international financial regulation questions and was Finance Counsellor at the EU Embassy in Washington DC. He has also been a Member of the Private Offices of Commissioners Charlie McCreevy and David Byrne. Before joining the European Commission in 1996, Peter advised major financial services companies on EU regulatory affairs. He is a Dutch national and holds a master degree in European affairs from the College of Europe in Bruges and a master degree in political science from the University of Leuven, Belgium.

Andrea Tessera is Chief Innovation Officer at Sella C-level executive with over 20 years of experience in international contexts and start-ups, where he has created brands, innovation waves, and digital growth for successful companies worldwide. As the Chief Innovation Officer at Sella, he leads a super talented team of vertical experts on various innovation streams, such as open finance, corporate venture capital, founder’s bank unit, digital assets, impact innovation, open innovation centers, web3, DLT, product design, customer experience, and UX/UI His passion is to build, impact, and innovate, leveraging emerging frameworks and technologies that can transform the financial industry and beyond. he has a significant expertise in innovation strategy, product and service development, and go-to-market execution, using web3, DLT, AI, data, and IoT. He has also worked with and managed some of the finest people in the business and built star teams from scratch.

Diederik Bruggink is ESBG Head of Payments, Digital Finance and Innovation. During his career, Diederik has lead and worked on several international projects, mainly with focus on cashless payments, across the whole payments value chain, from merchant acquisition through to issuing banks and within card switching and card processing organizations. His expertise also focuses on business strategy, proposition and business process issues, yet he brings systems expertise. He also brings in-depth knowledge of card scheme rules and regulations, and security. He has worked for or with very many banks, retailers, telephone operators, card processors, card schemes, acquirers and issuers, such as The Royal Bank of Scotland, WorldPay, ABN AMRO, MasterCard, Capgemini, ING, Equens, International Card Services, TSYS, Eufiserv, Vodafone, SafetyPay and Monnet. Diederik was one of the key authors of the first three editions of the World Payments Report.

Arianna Vannini is Principal Adviser for Strategic Foresight and Chief Economist in DG Internal Partnership. Prior to her current role, she was Economic Advisor in the Cabinet of Federica Mogherini, Vice President of the European Commission and High Representative of the Union forForeign Affairs and Security and before Member of President José Manuel Barroso Cabinet, where she was responsible in particular for competition policy and economic and financial matters. Her career in the European Commission started in 1995 when she joined the Cabinet of Commissioner Mario Monti. She was subsequently responsible for enforcement of antitrustrules in the area of liberal professions and media in her role of Head of Unit in DG Competition. Before joining the European Commission, Mrs Vannini was an official at the Bank of Italy in Rome. Mrs Vannini graduated in Economics at Bocconi University in Milan where she served as teaching and research assistant at the beginning of her professional career.

Veronika Pountcheva is member of the International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB).She was appointed as a full-time member of the International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB) in August 2022, effective 1 October 2022. Prior to her appointment, Ms Pountcheva served as Senior Vice President of corporate responsibility of METRO AG and Co-chief Executive Officer of NX Food, with responsibility for developing the company’s long-term sustainability strategy. She previously held leadership roles at METRO in Bulgaria, Ukraine, Germany and Serbia. Ms Pountcheva also chaired initiatives at the Consumer Goods Forum and Leading Executives Advancing Diversity. Ms Pountcheva holds a Master’s of Economics from the University of National and World Economy in Sofia and a Master’s of Mechanical Engineering and Chemistry from the Technical University of Sofia.

Dominique Goursolle, born Nouhaud, has spent most of her career at the head of urban transport in Périgueux (Péribus) and the family transport company Gonthier-Nouhaud, She is former vice-president of CESER Nouvelle-Aquitaine and the Urssaf Aquitaine. She has been involved in the cooperative life of the Caisses d’Epargne since 1999. She has been president of the orientation and supervisory board of the Caisse d’Epargne Aquitaine Poitou-Charentes since 2017 and was elected president of the Fédération Nationale des Caisses d’Epargne (FNCE). She is the first female president of the European Savings and Retail Banking Group (ESBG) since October 2021.

Karolin Schriever has been an Executive Member of the Board of the German Savings Banks Association (DSGV) since September 2022, with responsibility for the economics, politics and banking management division. Prior to this, she was Certified Public Accountant and Partner at KPMG AG, where she was responsible for KPMG’s accounting, banking supervision and sustainability practice. She held a number of other posts, including Lecturer in Auditing in the Financial Sector at the Frankfurt School of Finance & Management or Member of the Examining Commission at the Examination Office of the German Chamber of Public Accountants

Erik Ljungberg is Head of Group Brand, Communication and Sustainability at the Swedbank since 2020. Prior to this position, he worked for 12 years at the Scania Group AB where he respectively held the position of Senior Vice President, Corporate Relations followed by the position of Senior Vice President, Communications, Brand and Marketing.  In 2006, he worked in Germany for CLAAS KGaA as Head of Corporate Marketing.  From 1997 to 2006, Erik Ljungberg held various leading positions within Scania Group. He holds a M.Sc. in Business Administration.

Fiona van Echelpoel is Deputy Director General in the Directorate General Market Infrastructure and Payments (DG-MIP) of the ECB since January 2018. She has a broad background in central banking, having worked in a number of functions in the market infrastructure and market operations areas of the ECB since its establishment in 1998 and previously for its forerunner the European Monetary Institute (EMI); prior to that she worked at the Central Bank of Ireland. She represents the ECB in various European and international fora and chairs the ESCB CCP Working Group, co-chairs the TARGET2-Securities Cooperative Arrangement, the European Forum on the Security of Retail Payments (SecuRePay), the CPMI IOSCO Implementation Monitoring Sub-Group as well as being chair of the ECB’s Internal Crypto Assets Task Force. She holds a degree in Economics and Politics from University College Dublin.

Stéphanie Yon-Courtin was elected in May 2019 to the European Parliament where she is the vice-chair of the committee on economic and monetary affairs (ECON). Yon-Courtin is also a substitute member in the internal market and consumer protection committee (IMCO) and in the tax matters sub-committeen (FISC). In addition, she is the chair of the delegation for relations with Canada and a member of the delegation for relations with the United States. Prior to her election, she served as mayor of Saint-Contest, and vice-president of the urban community Caen la Mer. Before that, Yon-Courtin worked as an advisor on international affairs in the office of Bruno Lasserre, former president of the French Competition Authority. Yon-Courtin holds a master’s degree in law from the Universities of Caen and Bristol, and a master’s degree in European Business Law from the Institute of European Studies

François-Louis Michaud is the Executive Director of the European Banking Authority. He was appointed on 1 September 2020. Since March 2014, he had been a Deputy Director General at the European Central Bank, with responsibilities in the Single Supervisory Mechanism (SSM) first for horizontal and specialised topics, then for the supervision of the largest European banks. Previously, whilst a Deputy Director at France’s Autorité de Contrôle Prudentiel et de Résolution, he had been closely involved in the preparations for the SSM since 2012. At the Bank for International Settlements before (2005-09), he worked on the global financial system’s vulnerabilities and served as the Secretary to the Markets Committee, a forum for central banks’ market operations officials. He started his career at Banque de France in 1996, where he held various roles in banking supervision, policy and financial stability, before being seconded to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (2004-05). He graduated in Economics (from Paris-Dauphine), Finance, and Philosophy.

Ana Puente Pérez is the Head of Sustainable and Digital Finance at the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation in Spain. She has over 15 years of experience in the financial sector, working on legislation, policy, and regulation of financial markets and instruments. She has a double degree in Business Administration and Law from the Universidad Pontificia Comillas. She is also a volunteer at Cáritas Madrid, a social organization that helps people in need. She speaks fluent English and French. She is interested in artificial intelligence, machine learning, data science, and digital marketing.

Patricia Reilly is Head of Cabinet for Commissioner Mairéad McGuinness, EU Commissioner for Financial Services, Financial Stability & Capital Markets Union. She was previously the Deputy Chief Veterinary Officer in the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine where she led five departmental policy divisions on areas including food safety and food authenticity, veterinary medicines and residues, anti-microbial resistance, animal health and welfare, TSEs and animal by-products. Mrs. Reilly has extensive experience across the European Commission starting in the Cabinet of Commissioner Máire Geoghegan-Quinn in Research, Innovation & Science. She then served as a Cabinet Expert focused on the Joint Research Centre (JRC) and the European Institute for Innovation and Technology. From 2016 to 2019 she was Deputy Head of Cabinet for Commissioner Tibor Navracsics in Education, Culture, Youth, Sport & the JRC, and later became Advisor to the Director General of the JRC. Mrs Reilly is Chair of the Governance Committee of BiOrbic and on the Board of the Tyndall National Institute. She holds degrees in veterinary medicine, law, and European Food Regulatory Affairs.

Chris Burns is a Franco-American journalist and media consultant with 25 years’ reporting experience in Europe, the U.S., Africa, Central Asia and the Middle East. He has covered armed conflicts, election battles, financial crises, natural and human disasters and film festivals.
Chris Burns now hosts a hard talk programme on Euronews titled “The Network”, after reporting for CNN, Bloomberg TV and the Associated Press. He is also a media consultant, media trainer and video producer, and has moderated panels including the World Economic Forum.
A graduate of political economy at the University of California, Berkeley, Chris speaks five languages, has dual US-French nationality, and lives in Brussels with his wife, two kids and three guitars.

Thomas Matis has over 9 years of experience at KPMG Germany. In his current role, Thomas serves as the driving force behind the securities distribution practice and holds the co-lead position for the German private banking & wealth management focus team. He has successfully led numerous national and international strategic projects, specializing in securities distribution regulation and the increasingly vital field of Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG). Prior to his impactful contributions at KPMG, Thomas honed his skills at an international private bank, gaining a comprehensive understanding of the industry. As an alumnus of the Frankfurt School of Finance & Management, he holds both a Bachelor and Master of Science in Finance.

Maria Iride Vangelisti is a director in the Bank of Italy’s Department of Financial Education, where she is involved in the activities of the G20 Global Partnership for Financial Inclusion and the Italian Committee for Financial Education. She has also worked for more than 20 years in the Bank of Italy’s Department of Payment Systems and Services, participating in numerous working groups at the Bank for International Settlements and the European Central Bank. Her work on payment issues has been published widely.

Experienced Financial Director with a demonstrated history of working in the education management industry. Skilled in Non-profit Organizations, Event Management, International Relations, Fundraising, and Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs). Strong finance professional with a Bachelor’s degree focused in Foreign Trade & International Organisations and Integration from Univerzitet ‘Sv. Kiril i Metódij’ vo Skopje.

Senior expert, conduct, payments and consumers, European Banking Authority
Noemie leads the financial education work carried out by the Joint Committee of the three European Supervisory Authorities, including the publication of a recent factsheet on the impact of inflation and interest rate rises on consumers and the forthcoming factsheet on sustainable finance. In her role at the EBA, Noémie leads the EBA’s convergence work in retail conduct supervision and mystery shopping. She also work on digital matters for example on AI and crypto-assets, in particular the recent public consultation on the RTS on complaints handling under MiCAR .
Prior to joining the EBA, Noémie Papp worked for more than 7 years at the European Banking Federation (EBF) where she was head of digital and retail banking. She led the strategy on digital and retail banking including on payments, FinTech, Artificial intelligence, cloud computing, e-identification, data etc. Previous to that experience Noémie worked for almost two years in a worldwide public relations and public affairs consultancy in Brussels.
Noémie obtained an LL.M on Competition law and economics from the Brussels School of Competition in Brussels and a Master II (equivalent to an LL.M) in European Litigation from the Université Panthéon-Assas Paris II in France.

Miles Larbey is Head of the Financial Consumer Protection, Education & Inclusion Unit at the OECD Directorate for Finance & Enterprise Affairs.  In this role, he is responsible for the OECD’s work on international standards and best practice relating to financial consumer protection and financial literacy, including the G20/OECD High Level Principles on Financial Consumer Protection and the OECD Recommendation on Financial Literacy.  Particular areas of focus include the development of national strategies for financial literacy, the impact of digitalisation, sustainable finance, demographic changes, consumer vulnerability and financial inclusion.  Before working at the OECD, Miles was a senior executive at the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, and was the first General Manager of the Investor Education Centre in Hong Kong.

Gabriela Ramos is the Assistant Director-General for the Social and Human Sciences of UNESCO, where she oversees the institution’s contributions to building inclusive societies. Her mandate includes tackling economic inequalities of income and opportunity, and promoting social inclusion and gender equality. She also oversees the youth support agenda, promotion of values through sport, fight against racism and discrimination, and ethics of science, including of neurotechnology and the internet of things. She has overseen the development and adoption of the first global instrument to promote the ethics of artificial intelligence, adopted by acclamation in 2021 by UNESCO’s General Conference. She also launched the Global Forum against Racism, to catalyse the political support that member countries have given to this cause. On gender, she has advanced several initiatives, particularly to combat gender stereotypes and biases, including in new technologies. She also leads the Management of Social Transformations (MOST) Programme to help UNESCO Member States strengthen the connection between research and policy and between knowledge and action. She has overseen the publication on “Inclusive and resilient societies: equality, sustainability and efficiency” Previously, Gabriela Ramos worked as Cabinet Director and Sherpa for the G20, G7 and APEC at the OECD, contributing to increasing the OECD’s global impact and leading key initiatives such as “Inclusive Growth”, “New Approaches to Economic Challenges”, “Climate Change and Growth”, the gender equality strategy and work on well-being and children. At the G20, she contributed to the international reform for fair tax systems; the adoption of the gender-quota (to reduce the labour gap) and the establishment of the W20; and the adoption of the principles of artificial intelligence, among others. She also oversaw Global Relations and the OECD’s membership enlargement process. She is a member of the G7 Gender Equality Advisory Council (GEAC) for 2022, an independent advisory body that develops recommendations on gender equality issues across the entire G7 agenda. In 2019, she launched the Business for Inclusive Growth (B4IG) platform, bringing together 40 multinational companies committed to reducing inequalities. Previously, she was Director of the OECD Office in Mexico and Latin America where she supported reforms in education, telecommunications, gender and health. She was a member of the Mexican Foreign Service. In 2013 she was awarded the Order of Merit (Ordre du Mérite) by the President of France. Her work to promote gender equality has earned her several awards including from Forbes and Apolitico. She has been a Fulbright and Ford McArthur Fellow. She is an alumna of Harvard University’s Masters in Public Policy and Universidad Iberoamericana’s BA in International Relations. She is a board member of the “Paris Peace Forum”; the “UNICEF Advisory Board”; as well as the “Lancet Commissions on COVID and on Men’s Violence against Women”, and member of the Danone “Entreprise à Mission” Committee

Anu Raijas is PhD and Adjunct Professor in Consumer Economics. She works currently as an Adviser in Financial Literacy at the Bank of Finland Museum. In her work, she is responsible for the activities in financial education at the Bank of Finland and implementing the national strategy of financial education. Earlier she has worked as a Head of Research, Senior Researcher and University Lecturer at the Finnish Competition and Consumer Authority, National Consumer Research Centre, the University of Helsinki, LTT Research/Electronic Commerce Institute and Academy of Finland. Her research and teaching activities have focused on financial literacy, private consumption, households’ economic living conditions, indebtedness, and financial decision-making within families.

Principal Advisor
e.: ines.scacchi@wsbi-esbg.org
t.: +32 2 2111147
m.: +32 0490 42 65 99