Vincent Barakat is EMEA Finance Director at GE Healthcare Life Sciences division (ex Amersham). Mr Barakat’s current responsibilities include protecting the company from credit risks, FX exposure and market slowdown. He joined GE in 2002 as Financial Analyst based in Paris where he held different operational finance roles. In 2008 he became Finance Manager – FP&A Emerging Markets based in Istanbul where he built the local finance team and managed the 1st cycle of the financial crisis. From this he moved, in October 2010, to his current position based in London. Mr Barakat is of Lebanese and French origin. He completed his business studies at ESSEC, France and his Engineering degree at École Supérieure d’Ingénieurs de Beyrouth. In 2011 he completed an Experienced Finance Leadership Programme and has been involved recently in a series of conferences and economics lectures where he has interpreted the current economic environment and its business impact.

Brian Groom was appointed Financial Times’ UK Business and Employment Editor in January 2009, having spent four years as Comment and Analysis Editor. Prior to that Mr Groom was the Editor of the continental European edition for three years. Before that he was Political Editor and UK and Regional Affairs Editor. Mr Groom first joined the FT in 1978, writing on labour issues. He was part of the team that launched the European edition in 1979 and he became UK News Editor in 1985. Between 1988 and 1997 he worked on Scotland on Sunday where he was Deputy Editor until 1994 and then Editor for three years. He returned to the FT in 1997. He graduated from Balliol College, Oxford, in 1976.

Stewart Hodges is Professor Emeritus at Cass Business School where he has taught from 2009. Prof Hodges formerly spent extended periods at the London Business School and subsequently at the University of Warwick where he established and directed both the Financial Options Research Centre and the MSc in Financial Mathematics. His research interests relate to the theory and practice of derivatives valuation, risk measurement and management. They span commodities and energy as well as fixed interest and equities. Besides being widely published in these areas, he has acted as a consultant on them to a variety of financial institutions.

Phil McCabe leads the Structuring team at Lloyds Bank Wholesale Banking & Markets, which is based within Sales and is strongly client focussed. The team designs both asset and liability solutions and contains product specialists across rates, FX, commodities and credit. Mr McCabe joined Lloyds Banking Group from RBS in 2010 where he was responsible for Rates Structuring, prior to which he was a rates exotics trader for ABN AMRO, a Quantitative Analyst and a Statistician in Industry. He has a PhD in mathematical analysis and was a university lecturer prior to joining ABN.

Paul Phillips joined easyJet as Group Treasurer in 2006. Mr Phillips' introduction to treasury was accounting for Ford Of Britain in the early 1980s and since then he has held treasury positions with Blue Circle, National Grid and SABMiller. He is a Chartered Accountant and Fellow of the Association of Corporate Treasurers. 

Yuri Polyakov works extensively with corporate, public sector and financial institutions clients providing strategic finance and risk management advisory services including ALM, integrated risk assessment, balance sheet and financial risk management. Mr Polyakov has been involved in numerous strategic transactions and helped a number of clients formulate their risk management strategy. Prior to joining Lloyds, he was a Head of the Strategic Risk Management group at Barclays Capital. Prior to Barclays Capital, he was with Nomura Capital Markets, Citigroup’s Financial Strategies Group where he headed coverage of Latin American, Asian and Australian clients. He was also involved in developing risk management strategies for a number of government agencies and sovereign controlled entities. Prior to Citigroup, he was at the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce. He holds a BA in Computer and Information Science with Honors from Brooklyn College of the City University of New York and an MBA from Stern School of Business of the New York University. He has presented at numerous industry and research conferences and co-authored a number of publications.