The industry’s premier event has returned in its full glory following two challenging years of virtual presence.
After a two-year gap, UniCredit Global Securities Services, as one of the forum’s founding partners, had the pleasure to participate at the Network Forum in London. This unique conference, held annually, brings together majority of key players from both the Securities Services and Payments industries. Following the last physical event, held in Athens three years ago, this year once again welcomed professionals representing global custodians, broker-dealers, local and regional agent banks, stock exchanges, CSDs and post-trade professionals from all across the world.
It is a must-attend event for the Securities Services industry with particular focus on building relationships, as organisers recognised “the transformative power of those relationships to enable industry-changing dialogue”. The two main conference days addressed many challenges the industry is facing today, especially following two difficult years of dealing with the global pandemic. Through presentations and panel discussions , delegates had the opportunity to engage in discussions on the most relevant topics ranging from cyber security and digital assets, to geopolitics.
On the first day of the conference, Julia Barbara Romhanyi, Global Head of Securities Services joined the panel discussion covering the topic„It’s All About The Staff: How To Maintain A High Level Of Competence And Retain Talent”which explored the challenges and advantages of recruitment trends in the industry as well as how to retain talents in such a competitive landscape with a more flexibiliy and trusted approach towards the teams. Julia provided concrete examples of talent management which UniCredit GSS has further stregthened in the last years with UniCredit’s key values on integrity, ownership and flexibility seeing it as a key factor for talent retention. CSDR was another interesting and topical discussion point during the event. Katalin Bóta, Head of GSS Product and Project Management, was one of the panellists who participated in the panel „What’s Next For CSDR: A Review”. Katalin, leveraged on her experience in various securities services’ regulatory projects, while reiterating the crucial role of staff and cooperation amongst all the stakeholders as some of the most important success factors.
In light of growing interest, the digital asset space was another actual topic examined during the conference, where there was a common consensus shared in the need to acquire a deeper understanding and expertise, both at the market infrastructure and provider levels, to meet client expectations and requirements.
Other sessions covered numerous important topics, including an overview of emerging innovative technologies and investment instruments transforming the industry and how these technologies, such as Fintech and DLT platforms, can fit into the traditional banking industry and reduce risks. Additionally, a major focus was on the evolving geopolitical landscape, which, in itself, is now posing challenging and unpredictable scenarios for future strategies.
During the event, the UniCredit GSS Team was strongly engaged with clients sharing expertise and, as a result, the UniCredit stand was a popular meeting point throughout the conference.
