Anton Raath

Chief Executive: Glacier by Sanlam

Anton was appointed chief executive of Glacier by Sanlam in January 2005.

Anton began his career at Ironside Greenwood before joining Southern Life in 1983. In 1996 he was appointed director of business services at Southern Asset Management. Two years later he took up the role of chief operating officer. He was appointed head of retail at Gensec Asset Management in January 2000. Later that year, he was appointed deputy managing director and chief operating officer (COO) at Sanlam Investment Management (SIM). In 2002, Anton was appointed managing director of Sanlam Private Investments (now Sanlam Private Wealth) while still continuing to fulfil his duties as COO at SIM.

Anton is a chartered accountant with higher diplomas in Accounting (University of Witwatersrand) and Tax Law (University of Cape Town).

Back | Top

Dr Amlan Roy

Head of Global Demographics and Pension Research: Credit Suisse

Dr Roy is the head of Global Demographics and Pensions Research in the investment banking division of Credit Suisse, based in London. He is also a senior research associate of The London School of Economics Financial Markets Group and a guest professor of the finance department of the London Business School.

Prior to his current role, Dr Roy was a Global Emerging Markets Strategist at Credit Suisse. He joined Credit Suisse in 1998 from the University of London where he taught at Queen Mary and Westfield College and The London School of Economics. Prior to this he held similar positions at the University of Iowa and Boston University. He received four teaching awards from University of Iowa Business School and Boston University School of Management. He served as an expert on financial architecture and Crises Modelling at the Bank of England, the IMF, and the US and UK Treasury.

Dr Roy holds an MA and PhD in Financial Economics from the University of Iowa, an MBA (IIM Ahmedabad, India) and a BA Honours in Economics (St. Stephen's College, University of Delhi, India). He was named a UK ERSC Research Fellow, Ponders Fellow, a Boston University Doctoral Scholar and a Government of India National Scholar.

Back | Top

Roland Rousseau

Head of Barclays Risk Strategy Group : Institutional Portfolios & Risk Solutions

Currently Roland Rousseau is responsible for the Barclays Risk Strategy Group which is a specialised unit within Barclays Africa Group tasked with actively monitoring and managing institutional clients’ portfolio risk.

Prior to this he was the equity investment strategist for Barclays in SA (four years). Before joining Barclays in 2011, Roland spent 14 years at Deutsche Bank, where he was part of the investment strategy team and headed up quantitative research where he published several award-winning international research reports. He was also rated as the number one analyst in his field seven times by the Financial Mail.

At Deutsche Bank he worked with institutional investors such as pension funds, sovereign wealth funds and asset consultants in South Africa as well as in the UK, Europe, Scandinavia and Australia on innovative portfolio construction, how to integrate active and passive investment solutions and implement more effective risk management. Roland is also currently an active committee member of the FTSE/JSE Index Advisory Committee, which is responsible for all official stock exchange indices in South Africa.

Back | Top

Michael Mark

Chief Executive Officer: Truworths International Limited

Michael serves as an executive chairman and chief executive officer of Truworths International. He combines 27 years of experience in the retail industry with an ability to retain focus on the Truworths key competencies and an unrivalled understanding of the dynamics of fashion retailing. Michael’s vision and leadership have enabled the Truworths Group to achieve exceptional financial performance, including significant growth in turnover, earnings, trading density and return on equity on a consistent basis over an extended period. He has been a director of Truworths International since July 1988 and a director of Truworths Limited since 1991. He has also been an executive director of Young Designers Emporium since February 2004. Michael holds the following qualifications: BCom, MBA and ACMA.

Back | Top

Facilitator

Patrice Rassou

Head of Equities: Sanlam Investments

Patrice Rassou was appointed head of equities at Sanlam Investments (SI) in 2011, having previously held the position of senior portfolio manager. He manages the SIM General Equity Fund & SIM Top Choice Fund, as well as specialist financial mandates and the SIM equity house view. He is also responsible for equity selection for the SIM Low Equity Fund. Patrice is one of South Africa’s leading banking sector analysts and is a regular and sought after media commentator.

He started working at PricewaterhouseCoopers in London and passed his qualifying examination for the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England & Wales in 1994. He completed his MBA at Manchester Business School in 2003 with distinction. Patrice also completed an executive leadership programme at GIBS in 2014, and also served on the Board of ABSIP Western Cape Chapter.

Patrice completed his BSc (Econ) degree in Monetary Economics with first class honours from the London School of Economics. In 1992 he completed his MSc (Econ) after winning a scholarship from the London School of Economics.

Back | Top

Master of ceremonies

Maya Fisher-French

Journalist

Maya Fisher-French is a well-known South African financial journalist with her own website MayaonMoney.co.za.

She is editor of My Money My Lifestyle, the personal finance section of national Sunday newspaper City Press for which she won the 2013 Sanlam Award for Excellence in Financial Journalism under the category of Consumer Financial Education.

Maya edited the South African version of Dave Ramsey’s best seller “The Total Money Makeover” and has also published her own book, Maya on Money – Implement your money plan.

Apart from print media Maya hosted the JSE crossing for CNBC Africa and is a frequent guest on talk-radio shows. She is also a popular speaker at corporate events.

Prior to becoming a financial journalist in 2003, Maya worked in the financial industry for a stock-broking company where she developed their private client trading desk and headed up the offshore investment division. Prior to that she worked for Investec Private Bank as a consultant on their direct investment desk.

Maya has a BA in English and an Honours degree in Economics from the University of the Witwatersrand. In 2006 she received the award for Best Newcomer in the Sanlam Journalist of the Year awards for articles published in business magazine Maverick.

Back | Top