BlueMatrix Announces Panelists for 2016 Client Roundtable

The BlueMatrix London Research Roundtable promises to be an influential event for the research industry.

We thank our panelists, who will discuss the challenges and opportunities MiFID II presents for markets, consumers and products.

Simon Edwards, Head of Business Development at BlueMatrix, will moderate a discussion with Nicholas Mather, Chief Executive, TSL Research Group; Imogen Garner, Partner, Norton Rose Fulbright; Neil Shah, Director, Edison Investment Research; Francis Land, Director of Commission Management, IHS Markit.

Nicholas Mather, Chief Executive, TSL Research Group

Nicholas is the Chief Executive Officer of TSL Research and was a founder of Trusted Sources before its merger with Lombard Street Research and incorporation into TSL Research Group in 2016. Before establishing Trusted Sources in 2006, he was managing director of Breakingviews, the leading online financial commentary service started by former FT Lex journalists and purchased by Reuters in 2009. Prior to that, he spent 20 years in investment banking (BNP Paribas and CSFB) working in Asia and Europe.

In the 1990s, following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Nicholas worked in the newly created Russian financial markets, where he played a key role in the creation of a new investment bank in Moscow and arranged equity financings for newly privatized energy companies, as well as in Turkey, Bulgaria and The Lebanon. He graduated from York University with a degree in economics and is on the Board of the European Association of Independent Research Providers.

Imogen Garner, Partner, Norton Rose Fulbright

Imogen Garner is a financial services lawyer based in London. She advises a broad range of clients on the UK and EU financial services regimes. She has a particular specialist focus on advising asset and wealth managers, as well as institutional investors, custodians, depositary banks and other service providers to asset managers and funds. Imogen's asset manager clients employ diverse strategies, from UCITS and traditional long-only managers through to hedge, real estate, private equity and infrastructure funds, and she has worked with a number of asset management industry trade bodies.

Her clients are based in the EU and globally. Imogen is increasingly recognised as an expert in the Fintech, Regtech and cryptocurrencies/blockchain regulatory space. She is a regular speaker on these topics and co-leads Norton Rose Fulbright's Fintech regulatory practice in London.

Imogen has experience of working within the UK regulator, having spent nine months on secondment to the General Counsel's Division of the Financial Services Authority (the FSA, as it was then), where she advised the FSA's CIS Policy Team and HM Treasury on the EU's Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive.

Neil Shah, Director, Edison Investment Research

Neil Shah is the Director of Research at Edison Investment Research, one of the largest independent research firms, with offices in London, New York, Frankfurt, Sydney and Wellington. Neil joined Edison in January 2005. Neil started his career at Price Waterhouse in 1997 in the banking, capital markets and treasury tax team. In 1997 he joined the pan European research team at Goldman Sachs covering construction & building materials. He left Goldman Sachs in 2003 to set up Tusker Capital, a long-short hedge fund. Neil graduated from the LSE with a BSc in economics.

Francis Land, Director, Commission Management, IHS Markit

Francis Land joined IHS Markit in October 2016 and is EMEA Product Specialist for Broker & Research Services. These services encompass IHS Markit's solutions in Research Interaction & Evaluation, Commission (CSA) Management as well as their Research Payment Account ("RPA") services currently under development and being launched in 2017. Francis started his career at The Bank of New York, London in the Global Custody division, moving on to analyst and marketing roles for corporates in BNY's industry-leading Depositary Receipts division (ADRs and GDRs). Between 1998 and 2000 Francis worked in BNY's New York head office.

Returning to London in 2000, Francis headed up buy-side business development for BNY's DR Capital Markets department. In 2003 Francis launched the EMEA business for Westminster Research Associates, a BNY subsidiary and a leading independent provider of CSA aggregation and management services. He served as Westminster's EMEA Product Head prior to joining IHS Markit. Francis holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics and Politics from the University of Manchester.