Keynote Speakers
Blake Morgan
Author of the Customer of the Future
Blake Morgan is a keynote speaker and customer experience futurist and author of two books on customer experience. She’s a board member of customer service AI software Minerva. Her bestselling second book is called “The Customer Of The Future: 10 Guiding Principles For Winning Tomorrow’s Business” (HarperCollins), identified by Business Insider as one of the top 20 books executives are reading to deal with COVID-19. In 2021 the book won a top 5 spot on Book Authority’s list of the “Top 100 Future Of Technology Books of All-Time.” Blake Morgan was called one of the top 40 female keynote speakers for 2020 by Real Leaders Magazine. Her first book was “More is More: How The Best Companies Work Harder And Go Farther To Create Knock Your Socks Off Customer Experiences.” She has worked with Comcast, Allstate, Genentech, Accor Hotels, Accenture, Adobe, Cisco, Parker Hannifin, Ericsson, Verizon, and more. Blake is a guest lecturer at Columbia University, the University of California, San Diego as well as adjunct faculty at the Rutgers executive education MBA program. Blake contributes to Forbes, the Harvard Business Review and Hemispheres Magazine. She is the host of The Modern Customer Podcast and The Be Your Own Boss Podcast. She lives in the Los Angeles Area with her husband, their two children and two dogs.
Esther George
President and Chief Executive Officer – Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City
As CEO of the Kansas City Fed, George leads a workforce of more than 2,000 employees located at the Bank’s Kansas City office and Branch offices in Denver, Oklahoma City and Omaha. The Kansas City Fed oversees seven states: western Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Colorado, Wyoming and northern New Mexico. Throughout this region, the Kansas City Fed plays a role in national monetary policy, supervises financial institutions and provides payment and financial services to depository institutions and the U.S. Treasury.
George joined the Fed in 1982 and served much of her career in the Division of Supervision and Risk Management. She began by becoming a commissioned bank examiner and eventually served for ten years as the District’s chief regulator. In that capacity, she was responsible for oversight of the District’s state-chartered member banks and nearly 1,000 bank and financial holding companies, as well as the Bank’s discount window and risk management functions. She was directly involved in the Tenth District’s banking supervision and discount window lending activities during the banking crisis of the 1980s and post-9/11.
She is a former chair of the Federal Reserve System’s Community Banking Organizations Management Group. George has also served as the acting director of the Federal Reserve’s Division of Banking Supervision and Regulation at the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System in Washington, D.C.
George is a native of Missouri. Beyond the Tenth Federal Reserve District, she hosts the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City’s annual Jackson Hole Economic Symposium. She has also participated in the Bank for International Settlement’s Financial Stability Institute programs in Lima, Abu Dhabi, Beijing and Malaysia.
Loretta Mester
President and Chief Executive Officer – Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland
As president and chief executive officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, Loretta J. Mester participates in the formulation of U.S. monetary policy and oversees more than 1,000 employees in Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Pittsburgh who conduct economic research, supervise banking institutions, and provide payment services to commercial banks and the U.S. government. She assumed her role as president and CEO in June 2014.
Dr. Mester was born in Baltimore, MD. She graduated summa cum laude with a bachelor of arts degree in mathematics and economics from Barnard College of Columbia University. She earned M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in economics from Princeton University, where she was a National Science Foundation Fellow.
Prior to being named president and chief executive officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, Dr. Mester was executive vice president and director of research at the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, where she served as the chief policy advisor, attended meetings of the Federal Open Market Committee, and oversaw the economists and analysts in the Research Department, as well as professionals in the Financial Statistics Department and the Payment Cards Center. She joined the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia in 1985 as an economist, becoming senior vice president and director of research in 2000, and executive vice president and director of research in 2010.
Dr. Mester is an adjunct professor of finance at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. She has also taught in the undergraduate finance and M.B.A. programs at Wharton and in the Ph.D. program in finance at New York University.
Her areas of research expertise and interest include the organizational structure and productive efficiency of financial institutions, financial intermediation and regulation, agency problems in credit markets, credit card pricing, central bank governance, and inflation. Dr. Mester has published numerous articles in refereed academic and professional journals on a variety of topics, including economics, central banking, and financial intermediation and regulation. In addition, she is a co-editor of the Journal of Financial Services Research and an associate editor of several other academic journals.
Dr. Mester is a director of the Greater Cleveland Partnership, a trustee of the Cleveland Clinic, a trustee of the Musical Arts Association (Cleveland Orchestra), a director of the Council for Economic Education, a founding director of the Financial Intermediation Research Society, a member of the senior council of the Central Bank Research Association (CEBRA), and a member of the advisory board of the Financial Intermediation Network of European Studies (FINEST). She is a member of the American Economic Association, the American Finance Association, the Econometric Society, and the Financial Management Association International.
Panel Session Speakers
Instant Payments in the U.S.
Nick Stanescu (moderator)
Senior Vice President of FedNow, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston
Nick Stanescu is a senior vice president at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston and the business executive of the FedNowSM Service, with business responsibility for the new round-the-clock real-time payment and settlement service that the Federal Reserve Banks are developing to support instant payments in the United States. In this role, he leads the product management, industry readiness, business integration, business operations and resilience functions and guides product marketing and sales activities for the Service. Previously, Nick served as the head of payments product management of the Wholesale Product Office at the New York Fed. He had business responsibility for the Fedwire Funds and National Settlement Services on behalf of the 12 Federal Reserve Banks. Collectively, these services clear and settle financial transactions exceeding $3 trillion per day and are foundational to the U.S. financial system.
Ulrike Guigui
Executive Vice President, Head of Enterprise Payments, Wells Fargo
Ulrike Guigui is the Executive Vice President of Enterprise Payments at Wells Fargo and is responsible for leading the company’s enterprise payments strategy. She works across the company and with industry partners to ensure Wells Fargo is strategically aligned and positioned for growth opportunities in the payments industry, as well as to help shape the future of money movement. Ulrike has years of experience in the payments and consumer finance industry and has held positions with issuers and payment companies in Europe and the U.S. Ulrike joined Wells Fargo from Deloitte Consulting LLP, where she was most recently Managing Director and head of Deloitte’s Payments Practice. She also previously held leadership positions at Citigroup, GE Capital, Mastercard and Acculynk in the U.S. and Europe.
Michael Bilski
Chief Executive Officer, North American Banking Company
Michael Bilski, North American Banking Company’s Chief Executive Officer, is a third-generation banker with 40 years of solid banking under his belt. As a founder of North American Banking Company, he embraces the idea of banking with no boundaries and utilizes his expertise in information technology to keep the product line ever evolving. Never one to accept the status quo, Mike continually explores ways to create value for the client and holds the staff at North American to the same high standard. “We’ve worked to build a team of people who are great at what they do, know how to have fun, and have an interest in giving back to the community.” Mike loves all things outdoors. Wanting to share that experience with others has inspired him to co-chair Friends of Camp Knutson, a camp for people with special circumstances. Mike is a former board member and secretary/treasurer of NACHA, the Automated Clearing House Association and a current board member of UMACHA, the Upper Midwest Automated Clearing House Association. He is also the current Chairman of the Board of the US Faster Payments Council.
Elspeth Bloodgood
Product Manager, Jack Henry Payment Solutions
Elspeth Bloodgood is a Senior Advisory Technical Product Manager for JHA PayCenterTM in the Jack Henry Banking® division of Jack Henry and Associates, Inc.® She began her career at Jack Henry in 2011 and has nearly 20 years of experience in the financial services industry. Throughout her career, Elspeth has gained an extensive background knowledge in electronic payments, specializing in online and biller direct bill pay. She is a subject matter expert in the Zelle®, RTP® and FedNow® networks. Additionally, Elspeth is an active participant in industry work groups with the Faster Payments Council, and National Automated Clearing House Association (NACHA. She got her start in payments participating in the X9B workgroup which developed the IRD standard. She resides in Louisville, Kentucky with her spouse, Dana.
Gail Hillebrand
Associate Director for Consumer Education and Engagement, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (retired)
Gail Hillebrand participates in the Faster Payments Council for the National Consumers League. She led the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s Division of Consumer Education and Engagement from its inception in 2011 through early 2020. The offices comprising this division developed financial education approaches for community-based service providers, developed web content for the public, and performed education and policy work with respect to four special populations: older adults, post-secondary students, active-duty military and veterans, and economically vulnerable people. The Consumer Response complaint handling office was also part of this division for some of her tenure. Gail served on the CFPB’s Executive Committee and other Bureau governance and policy committees. Prior to joining the CFPB, Gail was with Consumers Union, the nonprofit publisher of Consumer Reports, for over 25 years. There she engaged in consumer policy and advocacy work; and led a team focused on consumer protection in financial services. She worked on a wide variety of consumer financial services policy issues in the California legislature, other states, and in Congress. Gail’s publications address topics including payments, credit reporting, preemption, and the Uniform Commercial Code Revision process. In payments, she is the author of Before the Grand Rethinking: Five Things to Do Today with Payments Law and Ten Principles to Guide New Payments Products and New Payments Law, 83 Chicago-Kent Law Review 2, 769 (2008). Gail has testified multiple times in Congress and in state legislatures. She was appointed by two California governors of different parties to serve on the California Board of Accountancy. She is a member of the American Law Institute and the American College of Financial Services Lawyers. She has been a recipient of the National Consumer Law Center’s Vern Countryman Award. Gail holds a BA in Economics from the University of California at San Diego and a JD from Berkeley Law School.
Security, Fraud & Identity
Deborah Baxley (moderator)
Partner, Paygility Advisors
International mobile/cards payment/FinTech consultant, recognized expert in the industry, creator of growth strategies for new and existing markets with more than 20 years’ experience consulting to cards and payment companies. Managed and delivered over 100 strategic consulting projects for more than 60 clients in fifteen countries, advising issuers, acquirers, networks and processors on product direction and competitive positioning, delivering millions of dollars in new revenue or operating cost savings. Recognized for insights on the future of payments through frequent keynote speaking and writing and as Board Member, US Faster Payments Forum, Chair of US Payments Forum Mobile and Touchless Payments Working Committee, member US Federal Reserve Faster Payments Taskforce, and co-founder of NYPAY.
Patrick Eckerle
Head of Analytics, SentiLink
With over 5 years of Fraud Data Science and 10 years of technology experience, Patrick currently leads the analytics team at SentiLink. Prior to his time at SentiLink, Patrick was a data engineer for Instagram Reels where he led the data group working to optimize the engagement experience for one of Meta’s largest company priorities. Before that, he spent 4 years managing the enterprise Fraud Data Science team at Enova International. As the leader of the Fraud Data Science team, Patrick owned the fraud risk strategy and the fraud machine learning models that powered the decisioning for the billion-dollar FinTech leader. Patrick is an experienced software engineer and data scientist who lives in Chicago.
Una Dillon
Vice President, Global Expansion, Merchant Risk Council
Úna Dillon is VP of Global Expansion and Member Advocacy for the Merchant Risk Council (MRC). She is an Advisor on the European Commission Payments Systems Market Expert Group. She is 27 years in the payments industry and has held roles such as General Manager of the Laser Scheme, the former Irish national debit card scheme and has managed such projects as the roll out of Chip & PIN in Ireland for debit cards. She was Chair of the European Payments Council Card Fraud Prevention Expert Group for several years. For MRC, she leads the global expansion for the organization, currently focused on APAC and LATAM and brings the voice of the Merchant on all areas of payments regulation, to Financial Regulators globally.
Steve Silberstein
Chief Executive Officer, FI-ISAC
With more than 25 years of experience in financial services, technology and cybersecurity, Steve is responsible for overseeing FS-ISAC’s strategic direction and furthering the consortium’s mission to safeguard the global financial system by reducing cyber-risk. Prior to FS-ISAC, Steve served as the chief operating officer of BlueVoyant, a global cybersecurity firm based in New York City, where he led the strategic direction of the firm’s technology, marketing and administration activities. Prior to that role, Steve served as the CEO of Sheltered Harbor, an FSISAC subsidiary focused on resiliency solutions for banks. Steve also served as the chief technology officer at SunGard, a $3 billion global fintech company, until the company‘s acquisition by FIS in November 2015. Earlier in his career, Steve held senior technology positions at Chi-X Global, Lehman Brothers and FAME Information Systems. Steve is an adjunct professor at Fordham University’s Gabelli School of Business. He holds a bachelor’s in mathematics from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and is a photographer and runner in his spare time.
Rick Van Luvender
Senior Vice President, Information Security, Fiserv
In 2010 Rick was elected Chairman of the Payment Processor Information Sharing Council (PPISC). The PPISC was formed under the umbrella of the Financial Service Information Sharing and Analysis Center (FS-ISAC), to provide a forum for sharing information about fraud, threats, vulnerabilities and risk mitigation in the payments industry. FS-ISAC, a non-profit organization, is the only industry venue for collaboration on critical security threats facing the financial services sector. In the past Rick has served as the President of InfoSec Academy, a wholly owned subsidiary of Knowledge Key Associates, the industry leader in accelerated learning for information security. InfoSec Academy offers security consulting and certification training through outcome based, blended-learning programs for enterprises, government organizations and individual information security professionals. Over the last 20 years, Van Luvender is recognized as a leading Information Security Professional, with expertise in network and computer security, information and intellectual property protection, and industry-specific regulatory requirements. His work spans several vertical industries, including financial services, education, consumer products, and manufacturing. Rick served in the United States Marine Corps from March of 1989 to March of 1993 as a Nuclear Biological and Chemical Defense Specialist. Van Luvender is a member of the High Technology Crime Investigators Association Delaware Valley chapter, a member of the International Association of Financial Crime Investigators, a member of the American College of Forensic Examiners, and has served on several appointed and elected information technology consortiums.
Digital Currency
Timothy Massad (moderator)
Senior Fellow, Harvard Kennedy School
Timothy Massad is currently a Senior Fellow at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and an Adjunct Professor of Law at Georgetown Law School. Mr. Massad served as Chairman of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission from 2014-2017. Under his leadership, the agency implemented the Dodd Frank reforms of the over-the-counter swaps market and harmonized many aspects of cross-border regulation, including reaching a landmark agreement with the European Union on clearinghouse oversight. The agency also declared virtual currencies to be commodities, introduced reforms to address automated trading and strengthened cybersecurity protections. Previously, Mr. Massad served as the Assistant Secretary for Financial Stability of the U.S. Department of the Treasury. In that capacity, he oversaw the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), the principal U.S. governmental response to the 2008 financial crisis. During his tenure, Treasury recovered more on all the crisis investments than was disbursed. Mr. Massad was with the Treasury from 2009 to 2014 and also served as a counselor to the Treasury Secretary. Prior to his government service, Mr. Massad was a partner in the law firm of Cravath, Swaine & Moore, LLP. His practice included corporate finance, derivatives and advising boards of directors. He managed the firm’s Hong Kong office from 1999 to 2002 and represented governments and corporations on transactions throughout Asia. Mr. Massad helped draft the original ISDA standard agreements for swaps.
Tony Richards
Retired Head of Payments Policy, Reserve Bank of Australia
Dr. Tony Richards is Senior Advisor at the Digital Finance Cooperative Research Centre and also a consultant on payments, economics and financial issues. He retired from the Reserve Bank of Australia at the end of 2021, having served as Head of Payments Policy for 10 years, leading the Bank’s work on retail payments, crypto-assets and central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), real-time payments and financial market infrastructures. His earlier roles at the Reserve Bank included serving as Head of Economic Research and as Head of Economic Analysis, leading the main monetary policy department responsible for the analysis and forecasts for the Statement on Monetary Policy. He is a GAICD and holds a Bachelor of Economics (Honours) from the University of Sydney, a Master’s in Public Administration from Harvard University and a Ph.D. in Business Administration from the George Washington University.
Austin Campbell
Head of Portfolio Management, Paxos
Austin Campbell is the head of portfolio management at Paxos, responsible for managing the reserves behind all of the Paxos Stablecoin products (the 3rd largest Stablecoin platform in the world). Previously he has run fixed income derivative trading desks at JP Morgan and Citi and has been a portfolio manager at Stone Ridge, the parent of NYDIG. He holds a BS in Mathematics from CSU Chico and a MBA from NYU Stern. Austin lives in Park Slope with his wife Rajashree Campbell and their two children.
Dinesh Shah
Director of Fintech Research, Bank of Canada
As Director Fintech Research, Dinesh leads the technology aspect of the Bank of Canada’s research agenda in fintech and e-money. The research agenda encompasses the analysis of emerging and potentially disruptive technologies with wide applications to financial market infrastructure and the financial system. This analysis supports economic and financial system research into the implications of such technologies to the core mandates of the Bank of Canada. Prior to his current role, Dinesh was Technical Researcher in electronic payments and electronic money. His research focused on understanding and communicating the workings and impact of new technologies in finance, such as distributed ledger technology, and research into conceptual architectures for central bank issued e-money. Dinesh first joined the Bank of Canada in 2009 as an Enterprise Architect. Before joining the Bank, Dinesh has been a co-founder and architect at various start-ups. He spent 8 years as a developer of various fixed-income trading and risk management systems at financial institutions in London. In addition, he provided expertise on the application of leading-edge technologies to securities trading and clearing firms. Dinesh holds a BSc (hons) in Physics with Computing from The University of Kent in the U.K.
Global Payments
Jeremy Wing (moderator)
Executive Director – Global Delivery Lead, Real Time Payments
Jeremy is currently an Executive Director at JPMorgan- as lead for Global Product Delivery for Real Time Payments he manages the expansion of JPM’s global footprint, currently at 46+ countries and growing. Jeremy joined JPMorgan in 2012 with TSFX and has been obsessed with global payments ever since. Serving as Head of New Product Development for TSFX in JPM for several years before joining the RTP team his focus is always on client experience and leveraging the full suite of JPMs capabilities to create innovate solutions.
Carlos Eduardo Brandt
Deputy Head at Competition and Financial Market Structure Department of Central Bank of Brazil and the Head of Pix Management and Operation Team, Central Bank of Brazil
Carlos Eduardo Brandt is a deputy head at Competition and Financial Market Structure Department of Central Bank of Brazil and the head of Pix Management and Operation team. Graduated in engineering and law, specialized in finance and law, led Pix implementation process in Brazil and is currently leading and driving Pix’s evolving agenda. Brandt coordinates Pix Forum, a permanent advisory committee, whose purpose is to support BCB in its role of establishing Pix rulebook.
Thomas Lammer
Deputy Head of CPMI Secretariat, Bank for International Settlements (BIS)
Thomas Lammer is currently Deputy Head of the Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures (CPMI) Secretariat at the of the Bank for International Settlements. Before joining the CPMI Secretariat in 2019, he worked for more than eight years at the European Central Bank, most recently as Principal Market Infrastructure Expert/Team Lead in the Oversight Division. For three years he was a Senior Financial Sector Specialist at the World Bank. He started his career at Austria’s central bank in 2001, where he managed payment infrastructure implementation projects. payment infrastructure implementation projects. Thomas has published books, reports and articles on payments.
Andrew McCormack
Centre Head, BIS Innovation Hub Singapore
The BIS Innovation Hub fosters international collaboration on innovative financial technology within the central banking community. Andrew is an experienced Vice President of Technology with a demonstrated history of working in the banking industry. Strong information technology professional skilled in Management, Technology Strategy, Start-ups, and Product Development. Recent responsibilities included being Chief Information Officer and VP of Payments & Technology for Payments Canada.
