Dubai International Financial Centre, DIFC, has announced new additions to the speaker list and the final agenda for its inaugural Global Financial Forum, GFF, which will be held on Tuesday, 14th November, 2017, at the Four Seasons Resort Dubai.

GFF will explore geopolitical, technological and financial trends and discuss how they are affecting the finance industry today and in the future. With close to 400 executives and industry experts from global financial institutions selected to attend, the forum will take a broad view of the global finance while focusing on the Gulf’s crucial financial markets and looking at how that region plans to navigate shifts in the industry in the coming years.

As capital markets in the emerging economies have started to recover in 2017, new opportunities will start to emerge and the audience will be able to gain insights from Naina Lal Kidawi, Chairwoman of Max Financial Services and Soumaya Kanti Ghosh, Chief Economic Advisor of SBI, as they lead a panel discussion on financial reform in the emerging markets, and how those reforms will facilitate capital flow, create more favourable investment opportunities and which industries are poised to offer attractive returns.

Another topic that has been leading the headlines is regional trade deals and corridors initiatives like China’s ‘Belt and Road’. Saugata Bhattacharya, Senior Vice President and Chief Economist at Axis Bank along with Alicia Garcia Herrero, Chief Economist for Asia Pacific at Natixis, will lead talks on this topic.

Financial technology is another key item on the agenda of the GFF. Heather Henyon, Founder of the Women’s Angel Investor Network, and Samer Bohsali, partner with consulting firm Strategy and leader of the firm’s digital business and technology practice, will join previously announced speakers to cover FinTech’s latest trends and key players in emerging markets.

Keeping with the theme of financial technology as part of the next frontier for finance, Brian Behlendorf, Executive Director of Hyperledger, will be joining Leanne Kemp, Chief Executive Officer at Everledger, in a strategy session to explain how Blockchain promises to be a game changer in the finance industry and beyond.