Dubai International Financial Centre, DIFC, the leading international financial hub for the Middle East, Africa and South Asia region, MEASA, today announced the preliminary speaker list for its inaugural Global Financial Forum, GFF, which will be held on November 14th, 2017 under the patronage of H.H. Sheikh Maktoum bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Deputy Ruler of Dubai and President of DIFC.

The forum is set to convene an exclusive gathering of invited delegates to focus on ‘Navigating the New Order’.

Essa Kazim, Governor of DIFC, will give a welcome address, in front of an audience, which includes a speaker line-up that features Bill Winters, Group Chief Executive of Standard Chartered; Hafez Ghanem, Vice President of the World Bank for the Middle East and North Africa, Arif Naqvi, Group Chief Executive Officer at the Abraaj Group. Attendees will be uniquely positioned to thoughtfully identify and address the challenges and opportunities facing emerging markets today.

Through a series of deep-dive sessions and discussions, the GFF’s distinguished list of speakers will be exploring three main themes - Globalising Gulf Finance, Emerging Markets, and The Future of Finance.

Demola Sogunle, Chief Executive Officer of Stanbic IBTC Bank, will guide attendees as they seek to identify why some ‘emerging’ countries and regions are able to keep pace, while others fall behind. Kevin Sneader, Chairman of McKinsey, will support the forum as it identifies how the MEASA region plans to navigate shifts in the industry in the coming years.