Tim Fox is a prominent MENA economist and financial market analyst with specialist insight and expertise on the economic and commercial challenges of the GCC. With over 10 years of experience as Chief Economist of Emirates NBD, one of the biggest banks in the UAE, he created and built the research function there, and has in total over 30 years of experience in financial markets across three continents in London, New York and Dubai, where his focus ranged from G7 to emerging markets and foreign exchange. Tim has a profound understanding of the GCC and its issues, and he is a frequent commentator on global and regional business channels, also contributing to a number of prominent publications.

The 4th son of the 6th Marquis of Salisbury and a member of one of England’s most prominent families. A career military officer with distinction in the British Armed Forces, Lord Valentine held executive roles within NATO and the Ministry of Defence regarding Europe and Africa. Following retirement, Lord Valentine along with brother, Lord Michael, purchased Wilken Telecommunications Limited, in Kenya. During their ownership period, Wilken founded AfSat Communications Limited and Lord Valentine was instrumental in growing AfSat into Africa’s leading satellite-based Internet service provider with customers in 21 African countries and was instrumental in its sale to Mweb in South Africa, a subsidiary of JSE-listed Naspers Limited. Lord Valentine is a passionate believer in blockchain and disruptive technologies.

Fawad has over 18 years experience in the UK and Middle East in various leadership roles and has an extensive network of connections with government, quasi-government financial institutions. He has been involved in various high-profile transactions including sovereign bonds, public listing, managing co-investments programs for MEA based clients. Experience includes in buldge bracket banks like Credit Suisse, ABN AMRO, VTB Capital and Allied Investment Partners. Fawad is currently actively involved in the foundation of the digital asset regulatory landscape in the UAE.

Yabo has over ten years of experience in the financial industry including wealth management at Royal Bank of Canada in Toronto and financial advisory at Deloitte in Tokyo. Additionally, he has worked closely with regulators and ministries on several strategies and policy implementations within the Asia Pacific region. Since 2018, Yabo has provided independent advice on multi-family office services to HNWI and families based in Asia. He still works closely with Deloitte, focusing on innovation and new businesses incubation initiatives across Asia. In addition, Yabo supports several digital assets projects including co-founding one of the largest Blockchain & Crypto media company in Japan. Yabo is proficient in Japanese, Chinese Mandarin and English with conversational French and has client advisory experience across Asia, North America, and Europe. He is currently residing between the UK and Asia.