President Nikos Christodoulides is due to address the first Forbes Cyprus Next Gen Banking & Fintech Summit, which opens at the Four Seasons hotel in Limassol on Tuesday. The summit brings together the state, regulators, banks, fintech firms, investors and academics to discuss the future of the financial sector and the position Cyprus can claim in it.
The summit is organised by Phileleftheros in cooperation with Capital S.A. Some 250 guests are taking part, among them figures from the finance and technology sectors in the United States, the United Kingdom, Switzerland, other European countries and the Middle East.
Tasos Anastasiou, CEO of the Phileleftheros Media Group, will also give a welcome address. The event will be hosted by Elina Philippou, Senior Wealth Manager at Athlos Capital.
The keynote speech, ‘The FinTech Revolution and the Future of Banking’, will be given by Costas Markides, a Cypriot professor of strategy and entrepreneurship at London Business School who holds the Robert P. Bauman Chair in Strategic Leadership. He will set out the changes the fintech revolution is bringing and the outlook for banks.
In an interview with Forbes Cyprus ahead of the summit, Markides said the financial sector was moving towards a hybrid model in which traditional banks and fintech companies coexist. He added that the main challenge for Cyprus was to identify the areas where it could develop genuine competitive advantages.
Four panels
The summit’s four panel discussions will cover artificial intelligence, fintech growth, digital payments, cybersecurity and regulation, as well as the investment and other opportunities emerging for the Cypriot economy.
The first panel, ‘How a Small Island Wins: Building a Competitive Banking and Fintech Ecosystem in Cyprus’, will look at how a small economy such as Cyprus can compete internationally in financial services. Speakers are Deputy Minister of Research, Innovation and Digital Policy Nicodemos Damianou, Central Bank of Cyprus Governor Christodoulos Patsalides, Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) chairman Giorgos Karatzias and Invest Cyprus chairman Evgenios Evgeniou. It will be moderated by Dimitrios Zoppos, Partner at 33East.
The second panel, ‘AI and the Reinvention of Mainstream Banking’, will examine how artificial intelligence is reshaping traditional banking, the customer experience and financial services. Speakers are Dimitris Nicolaou, Chief Digital Officer at Bank of Cyprus; Laurent Rosfelder, Head AI Adoption & Partnerships, Global Wealth Management, and Managing Director at Swiss bank UBS; Andreas Asiotis, General Manager of Retail Banking at Eurobank; and Konstantinos Dovrolis, holder of the XM Chair in Artificial Intelligence and professor of computer science at the University of Cyprus. Christoforos P. Anayiotos, Board Member, Deal Advisory at KPMG, will moderate.
In an interview with Forbes Cyprus, Nicolaou described the shift from digital banking to AI banking, explaining how new technologies could allow banks to offer more personalised and proactive services.
The third panel, ‘The New Finance Stack: Digital Assets, Payments and the Service Economy’, will focus on digital assets, payments and technology-driven services. Speakers are Alexia Theodorou, European Head of Derivatives and CEO of Kraken Cyprus; Laura Miller, Chief Revenue Officer and Global Head of eCommerce at Nuvei; and Giorgos Kousis, Executive Director of Technology and Operations at Bank of Cyprus. It will be moderated by Pieris Chourides, Dean of the School of Business Administration and Digital Technologies at European University Cyprus. The discussion is expected to address changes in international transactions and new scope for cooperation between banks, fintech firms and technology providers.
The final panel, ‘Trust and Security in Digital Finance’, will deal with cybersecurity, operational resilience, data protection and the new risks created by the growing reliance of people and businesses on digital financial services. Speakers are Nicholas Kattirtzis, Head of Advisory – GRC at Odyssey Cybersecurity; Andreas Michaelides, Partner at Scordis, Papapetrou & Co LLC; and Solon Choutris, Chief Information Security Officer at XM. Ioannis Georgoulas, chairman of the Association of Cyprus Electronic Money and Payment Institutions (ACEMPI), will moderate.
Cyprus’s ambitions
More than 300 fintech companies already operate in Cyprus, Damianou said in an interview with Forbes Cyprus. Making the most of that base requires investment, skills development, public-private cooperation and an environment that encourages innovation.
The summit is presented by Bank of Cyprus. Gold sponsors are Kraken and XM; silver sponsors are European University Cyprus, Nuvei and Athlos Capital; Cablenet is the telecommunications sponsor; sponsors are Invest Cyprus, Samsung and Odyssey; and supporters are Utopia, Great Place to Work and Scordis, Papapetrou & Co.
