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INTERNATIONAL MONETARY FUND
Law & Financial Stability
Copyright
© 2020 International Monetary Fund
Cover design: IMF CSF Creative Solutions Division
Cataloging-in-Publication Data IMF Library
Names: International Monetary Fund, publisher.
Title: Law & financial stability.
Other titles: Law and financial stability.
Description: Washington, DC : International Monetary Fund, 2020. | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: ISBN 978-1-51352-300-2 (paper) | ISBN 978-1-51351-631-3 (web PDF) | ISBN 978-1-51351-689-9 (ePub)
Subjects: LCSH: Economic stabilization—Law and legislation. | Finance—Law and legislation. | Financial risk management.
Classification: LCC HB3732.L39 2020
DISCLAIMER: The views expressed in this book are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the IMF’s Executive Directors, its management, or any of its members. The boundaries, colors, denominations, and any other information shown on the maps do not imply, on the part of the International Monetary Fund, any judgment on the legal status of any territory or any endorsement or acceptance of such boundaries.
Recommended citation: International Monetary Fund. 2020. Law & Financial Stability. Washington, DC: International Monetary Fund.
ISBN: 978-1-51352-300-2 (paper)
978-1-51351-689-9 (ePub)
978-1-51351-631-3 (PDF)
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Contents
Preface
Contributors
I RESOLUTION OF FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS: IMPLEMENTATION OF THE KEY ATTRIBUTES AND REMAINING CHALLENGES
1 Keep Calm, Carry On . . . and Complete the Regulatory Reform Agenda
José Viñals and Aditya Narain
2 Bank Resolution within the European Banking Union: From Bail-Out to Bail-In
A. Joanne Kellermann and Myrte Meijer Timmerman Thijssen
3 Too Big to Fail: Where Are We Now?
Michael H. Krimminger
II CROSS-BORDER RESOLUTION: CHALLENGES IN CROSS-BORDER EFFECTIVENESS
4 Cross-Border Resolution between Cooperation and Ring-Fencing
Andrea Enria
5 Cross-Border Resolution: Progress and Challenges in Cross-Border Enforcement
Ross Leckow and Ender Emre
6 Cross-Border Resolution: A Global Solution to a Global Problem
Eva H. G. Hüpkes
III THE LEGAL FRAMEWORK FOR THE RESOLUTION OF CENTRAL COUNTERPARTIES: A SPECIAL CASE?
7 The New Frontier of Resolution Frameworks: Central Clearing Counterparties
Alessandro Gullo
IV CORPORATE DEBT RESTRUCTURING AND ECONOMIC RECOVERY
8 Debt Restructurings and Corporate Insolvencies
Luis Manuel C. Méjan
V CENTRAL BANK FUNCTIONS AND THE GROWING IMPORTANCE OF MACROPRUDENTIAL POLICY
9 New Tasks for the European Central Bank: Between Separation, Synergies, and the Preservation of Independence
Chiara Zilioli
10 Central Bank Legal Mandates and the Growing Importance of Macroprudential Arrangements: The Latin American Experience
Manuel Monteagudo
11 The Central Bank as Macroprudential Supervisor
François Gianviti
VI LEGAL FRAMEWORK FOR ISLAMIC BANKING
12 Promoting Financial Stability: Issues and Challenges in Islamic Finance
Jaseem Ahmed
13 Prudential and Liquidity Management Frameworks for Islamic Banks in Arab Countries
Inutu Lukonga
14 Financial Stability and Legal Frameworks for Islamic Bank Resolution and Anti-Money-Laundering/Combating the Financing of Terrorism
Elsie Addo Awadzi and Chady Adel El Khoury
15 International Efforts toward More Resilient Conventional and Islamic Banking Sectors: Implementation Challenges
Mehmet Siddik Yurtcicek and Mehmet Sefik Yurtcicek
Seminar Summary: Discussion on Corporate Debt
Panelists: Sean Hagan, A. Unnikrishnan, Sijmen de Ranitz, Richard Gitlin, and Luis Méjan
VII RECENT TRENDS IN FINANCIAL SECTOR REGULATION: THE PROBLEM OF DE-RISKING
16 Pressures on Correspondent Banking: Impact, Drivers, and Responses
Yan Liu and Francisca Fernando
Seminar Summary: Discussion on De-Risking
Panelists: AdelAl Qulish, Michaela Erbenova, Grovetta Gardineer, Sally Scutt, and Jose Luis Stein
Index
Preface
The papers included in this publication are based on presentations given at the IMF Legal Department’s flagship high-level seminar on Law and Financial Stability held on May 16–18, 2016, at the IMF headquarters in Washington, DC.
While the topics discussed during the seminar and in this publication cover a broad spectrum of issues, they all illustrate the important role that the law plays in contributing to financial stability at the international, regional, and national levels. Indeed, major steps have been taken by the international community and IMF member countries in strengthening financial sector legal frameworks since the global financial crisis. A key achievement has been the recognition, now embodied in the new standards for resolution regimes approved by the Financial Stability Board, that public authorities need strong and clear mandates and powers to resolve issues in financial institutions.
The seminar provided an important opportunity to review, from a legal perspective, the progress made in strengthening financial regulatory systems. In particular, it delved into the enhancement of resolution regimes for financial institutions and the key role played by legal regimes for insolvency. In this respect, as the distress of systemically significant financial institutions can create cross-border problems, the seminar also examined the development of a coherent international policy framework for resolution and resolution planning. It also examined the most effective legal models for the conduct of macroprudential policies and the implications for the governance and autonomy of central banks that arise from their macroprudential mandates.
At the same time, the seminar sought to examine emerging legal issues and to identify what remains to be done in the global financial regulatory agenda.
Of the many emerging legal issues discussed in the seminar, the subject of the legal aspects of Islamic banking received particular attention. The seminar also focused on the withdrawal of global banks from correspondent banking and other high-risk business relationships, dedicating a session to the issue of de-risking and ways to ensure that emerging markets and developing economies remain integrated within the international financial system.
In identifying what remains to be done, the seminar featured a high-level panel chaired by then Governor of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, Daniel Tarullo. The panel laid out a vision for the road ahead, including the need to improve ethical conduct by financial market participants and public authorities.
The agenda, indeed, is unfinished. It remains important to monitor whether international standards can help us deal with new risks and vulnerabilities, and to ensure that the global regulatory framework adequately takes into account the specific circumstances and needs of all IMF member countries, including emerging markets and developing economies.
The timing of the seminar coincided with a very important milestone for the IMF’s Legal Department: its 70th anniversary. This provided an ideal opportunity not only to reflect on the work done but also to lay out an agenda for the Legal Department going forward. Strengthening financial sector legal frameworks remains an issue of critical importance for the IMF, and part of its mandate to promote macroeconomic and financial stability. The IMF Legal Department works very closely with our members and other international organizations toward this objective and will continue to assist in the design and implementation of legal reforms that can foster financial stability.
The seminar represented an important step in this ongoing process of engagement with our membership, as demonstrated by the stimulating and productive discussions held among the speakers and participants, and further reflected by the diversity and high quality of the papers collected in this publication. By convening senior legal experts and policymakers from more than 80 countries, as well as from international organizations, academia, and private practice, the seminar reaffirmed that the process of legal reform is a cooperative endeavor, in which the IMF can also serve as a platform to share cross-country experiences.
Many IMF colleagues contributed to the design, planning, and organization of the seminar and the preparation of this volume. I wish to express our gratitude especially to a team led by Ross Leckow, previous Deputy General Counsel, and comprising Alessandro Gullo, Cristina Hayashi, Kajal Jagatsing, Laura Lorenzo, Mark Milford, Eric Robert, and Hans Weenink.
Rhoda Weeks-Brown
General Counsel and Director
IMF Legal Department
Contributors
Elsie Addo Awadzi is the Second Deputy Governor of the Bank of Ghana as of February 2018, managing financial regulation and financial stability, among other responsibilities. Before her appointment, she was Senior Counsel in the Financial and Fiscal Law Unit of the IMF’s Legal Department. In that role, she helped to assess the stability of financial systems in a number of Group of Twenty (G20) countries and provided technical assistance to help strengthen financial systems and manage financial crises in a variety of IMF member countries. She also advised on legal and institutional aspects of public financial management, public debt management, and fiscal responsibility frameworks. She is the coauthor of the 2015 IMF Working Paper, “Resolution Frameworks for Islamic Banks,” the 2017 IMF Board Paper, “Ensuring Financial Stability in Countries with Islamic Banking,” and the 2018 IMF Staff Discussion Note, “Trade-offs in Bank Resolution,” among others. She has spoken on Islamic bank resolution at a number of forums including the Law, Justice, and Development Conference hosted by the World Bank in 2015. She has taught courses at the IMF financial law seminars in Mauritius, Singapore, and Vienna. Before joining the IMF in 2012, Ms. Addo Awadzi was a two-term Commissioner of Ghana’s Securities and Exchange Commission, worked on key financial sector legal reforms in Ghana and other countries in Africa, worked briefly as a senior treasury dealer in Barclays Bank Ghana Limited, and worked in private law practice. She earned an LL.M. from the Georgetown University Law Center in Washington, DC, as well as an M.B.A. (in finance) and an LL.B. from the University of Ghana.
Jaseem Ahmed has 25 years of experience in financial sector reform issues and in the fields of public governance, expenditure management, and fiscal decentralization. He has extensive experience in macroeconomic and financial sector stabilization programs in Asia. He assumed the position of Secretary-General of the Islamic Financial Services Board (IFSB) on May 1, 2011. As Secretary-General, he is responsible for the formulation, issuance, dissemination, and adoption of IFSB standards for the prudential regulation and supervision of Islamic finance covering banking, insurance, and capital markets. Also as Secretary-General, Mr. Ahmed contributes to the development of global standards for ethical conduct and regulation of the financial sector through his participation in international bodies. He is a member of the Consultative Group of the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision and sits on the Consultative Advisory Groups of the International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board and the International Ethics Standards Board for Accountants. In addition, Mr. Ahmed is a member of the IMF External Advisory Group on Islamic Finance and a member of the Global Islamic Finance and Investment Group, a UK government advisory body.
Before his appointment to the IFSB, Mr. Ahmed served as Director of the Public Management, Financial Sector, and Trade Division of the Southeast Asia Department of the Asian Development Bank, where he managed the lending, technical assistance, and capacity-building operations in Southeast Asia for the banking sectors and nonbank financial institutions, and for the strengthening of supervision and regulatory capacities. Mr. Ahmed also led the Asian Development Bank’s response to the global financial crisis in Southeast Asia.
Mr. Ahmed was a member of the IFSB High-Level Task Force on Liquidity Management, which proposed the establishment of the International Islamic Liquidity Management Corporation. He is the coeditor of a book on Islamic finance and the editor of a book on regional economic cooperation in South Asia. Mr. Ahmed contributes to the development of educational standards as a member of the Governing Council of the International Centre for Education in Islamic Finance, a global university for Islamic finance.
He is a pro bono external adviser of the Art Acquisition Committee of Bank Negara Malaysia Museum and Art Gallery. Mr. Ahmed earned a B.A. in economics from the University of Sussex and an M.A. in economics and M.Phil. in economics from Yale University.
Chady Adel El-Khoury joined the IMF in 2007 and is currently Senior Counsel in the Financial Integrity Group in the Legal Department of the IMF. He specializes in anti–money laundering/combating the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT), anticorruption, governance, and broader integrity issues. His responsibilities include participation in surveillance, financing programs, and assessment missions; and the delivery of technical assistance projects related to these areas. He also works regularly on policy and research issues.
Before joining the IMF, Mr. El-Khoury worked as an analyst and legal expert at the Lebanese Financial Intelligence Unit (Special Investigation Commission). In this capacity, he regularly conducted financial analysis of money-laundering, associated offenses, and terrorist-financing cases. He also assisted the AML and CFT National Committees in developing and implementing policy decisions to enhance the effectiveness of the AML/CFT, anti corruption, governance regime in Lebanon.
Mr. El-Khoury holds a master’s degree in banking and finance law from Saint Joseph University in Lebanon and a master’s degree in finance from ESCP Europe in France.
Andrea Enria became the first Chairman of the European Banking Authority on March 1, 2011. He previously served as Secretary-General of CEBS, dealing with technical aspects of EU banking legislation, supervisory convergence, and cooperation within the European Union. He was also previously Head of Financial Supervision Division at the European Central Bank and worked for several years in the Research Department and as Head of the Supervisory Policy Department of the Bank of Italy. Mr. Enria earned a B.A. in economics from Bocconi University and an M.Phil. in economics from Cambridge University.
Francisca Fernando is a counsel with the Financial Integrity Group of the Legal Department at the IMF, working on AML/CFT-related issues in the context of IMF technical assistance, surveillance, and policy work. Before joining the IMF, she worked on related issues with the Financial Market Integrity Unit of the World Bank Group, for the Stolen Asset Recovery Initiative of the World Bank, and the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime. She has coauthored publications on related topics in areas such as the withdrawal of correspondent banking relationships, settlements in foreign bribery cases, and illicit financial flows. She holds a Master of Laws from the University of Toronto, a Bachelor of Laws from the London School of Economics and Political Science, and is called to the Bar of England and Wales.
François Gianviti was Director of the Legal Department from January 1986 and General Counsel since 1987, until his retirement from the IMF in December 2004.
He studied at the Sorbonne, the Paris School of Law, and the New York University School of Law. He obtained a licence ès lettres in 1959, a licence en droit in 1960, a diplôme d’études supérieures de droit pénal et science criminelle in 1961, a diplôme d’études supérieures de droit privé in 1962, and a doctorat d’Etat en droit in 1967. He was lauréat de la Faculté de droit de Paris and lauréat du concours général des Facultés de droit.
From 1967 to 1969, Mr. Gianviti was a lecturer in law, first at the Nancy School of Law, and subsequently at the Caen School of Law. In 1968, he was admitted to the Paris Bar. In 1969, he obtained the “agrégation de droit privé et science criminelle” of French universities and was appointed Professor of Law at the University of Besançon. From 1970 through 1974, he was seconded to the IMF Legal Department, as counsel, and later, Senior Counsel.
In 1974, Mr. Gianviti became Professor of Law at the University of Paris XII. He was Dean of the School of Law from 1979 through 1985. He is a member of the Monetary Committee of the International Law Association. He has received such decorations as a Chevalier des Palmes Académiques (France) and a Chevalier dans l’Ordre National du Mérite (France).
Alessandro Gullo is Senior Counsel in the Financial and Fiscal Law Unit in the Legal Department of the IMF, where he provides legal advice on supervisory and resolution regimes of financial institutions, crisis management, and public financial management issues. He has been extensively involved in advising IMF member countries on legal reforms to their financial and fiscal law frameworks in the context of IMF financial assistance programs, financial sector assessment programs, and technical assistance projects. Before joining the IMF in 2008, he worked in international law firms in Europe and in the United States. He has published and lectured on banking and financial law matters, such as on resolution frameworks of financial institutions, OTC derivatives clearing, credit rating agencies, and the EU crisis management regime. He received an LL.M. with distinction in international legal studies from Georgetown University and a J.D. from the University of Rome. He has been admitted to the New York Bar and to the Italian Bar.
Eva H. G. Hüpkes is Acting Head of Regulatory and Supervisory Policies at the Financial Stability Board. Before assuming her position in September 2009, she served as Head of Policy and Regulation with the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority. Dr. Hüpkes joined its predecessor, the Swiss Federal Banking Commission, in 1999. Before that, she worked in the Legal Department of the IMF. She is a member of the New York Bar and holds degrees in law and international relations from the University of Geneva, the Graduate Institute of International Studies, Geneva, and Georgetown University (LL.M., with distinction), and a doctorate in law (magna cum laude) from the University of Berne.
Dr. Hüpkes played a pivotal role in promoting effective resolution of financial institutions as Secretary to the Financial Stability Board’s groups working on resolution, as Co-Chair of the Basel Committee Working Group on Cross-Border Bank Resolution, and as member of the Advisory Panel of the International Association of Deposit Insurers. She also served as Consulting Counsel to the IMF, advising national authorities on the implementation of international standards relating to banking regulation, supervision, and crisis management, and is a lecturer in international financial regulation at the University of Zurich and Frankfurt Goethe University.
Joanne Kellermann was a board member of the Single Resolution Board in Brussels from its inception until early 2018. Before that, she was an Executive Member of the Governing Board of the Netherlands Central Bank, responsible for supervision. After receiving a master’s degree in civil law from Leyden University, she started her career as a lawyer in one of the Netherlands’ largest law firms, NautaDutilh. Having become a partner in 1992, she specialized in banking regulation and cross-border financial transactions and then headed the firm’s financial practice in London until 2005. After that, she moved to the public sector and joined the Netherlands Central Bank, initially as General Counsel. In 2007, she became a member of the Governing Board of the Netherlands Central Bank and was actively involved in all major crisis interventions in the Netherlands’ financial sector. During her term, she chaired the Financial Expertise Centre, the body coordinating the fight against fraud and financial crime in the Netherlands, and was a member of the Board of Supervisors of the European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority, EIOPA. She is currently Chairperson of the Board of Pensioenfonds Zorg en Welzijn and a nonexecutive member of the board of the University of Utrecht.
Michael H. Krimminger is a partner based in the Washington, DC, office of Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP. Mr. Krimminger advises domestic and international banking and financial institutions on the challenges and opportunities stemming from global statutory and regulatory reforms, as well as a variety of restructuring and insolvency matters.
Mr. Krimminger joined Cleary Gottlieb in 2012 after more than two decades in numerous leadership positions with the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, including most recently as its General Counsel. As General Counsel, he served as the Principal Legal and Policy Adviser to the Chairman and Board of Directors regarding the legislative development and later implementation of the Dodd-Frank Act, including its systemically important financial institution resolution, living wills, capital markets and capital, and structured finance requirements.
Mr. Krimminger’s international experience includes serving as the cochair of the Basel Committee’s Cross Border Resolutions Group and representing the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation on the FSB’s Resolution Steering Group. He has played a central role in bilateral and multilateral discussions with regulators around the world on legal reform, resolution planning, capital and liquidity requirements, and strategies for implementation of financial market reforms for derivatives and other financial market contracts.
Ross Leckow is is Senior Adviser at the Bank for International Settlements and was previously Deputy General Counsel of the Legal Department of the IMF. A national of Canada, Mr. Leckow has extensive experience in IMF regulatory and financial operations and currently leads the work of IMF lawyers on issues of financial sector law reform in member countries. He has also contributed to the IMF’s efforts to develop an international legal framework for the resolution of cross-border financial institutions. Before joining the IMF in 1990, Mr. Leckow practiced law in the private and public sectors in Canada. He lectures frequently in the United States and abroad on issues of international finance law.
Yan Liu is Assistant General Counsel in the Legal Department of the IMF, where she heads the Financial Integrity Group that deals with AML/CFT, tax evasion, and anticorruption issues at both the policy and the individual member-country level in the context of the IMF’s surveillance, program, and capacity-building activities. She also supervises the work of the Legal Department on the development and implementation of policies on sovereign debt restructurings. She leads a team of lawyers who provide advice on private sector debt resolution with a focus on corporate, household, and small- and medium-sized enterprises’ insolvency reform and enforcement of creditor rights. Before joining the IMF Legal Department in 1999, Ms. Liu was in private practice at Fried Frank Harris Shriver & Jacobson, and Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy, in the United States. A native of China, Ms. Liu received her legal education in China and the United States.
Luis Manuel C. Méjan is currently a part-time professor and researcher at the Law School of Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México. He worked at Banco Nacional de México for 30 years, occupying positions such as Executive Vice President–Legal Counselor to the chief executive officer, and Deputy Secretary of the Administrative Boards of the Bank and the Financial Group. He was President of Mexico’s Federal Institute of Commercial Insolvency Specialists (“Instituto Federal de Especialistas Mercantiles”) from 2000 to 2009. Dr. Méjan is the author of several books, mainly in financial and insolvency law, and has been a speaker at multiple organizations and forums. He is a member of several international associations in the insolvency field, including the Institute of International Insolvency, the American College of Bankruptcy, the International Exchange of Experience in Insolvency, and the Instituto Iberoamericano de Derecho Concursal.
Manuel Monteagudo has been General Counsel of the Central Bank of Peru since 1994. During his career at the Central Bank, he has held other positions, including Secretary General and Assistant Lawyer for the board’s counsel. Mr. Monteagudo obtained a law degree from the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru and an LL.M. from the University of Houston. He received a Ph.D. in law from the University of Paris 1 Pantheon-Sorbonne, with a thesis on the independence of central banks.
Mr. Monteagudo is a member of the Committee on International Monetary Law of the International Law Association and of the Society International Economic Law. He is also a professor at the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru and Director of the LLM Program of International Economic Law of the University of Peru.
His publications on international law issues include “Peru’s Experience in Sovereign Debt Management and Litigation: Some Lessons for the Legal Approach to Sovereign Indebtedness” (Law and Contemporary Problems 2010), Neutrality of Money and Central Bank Independence in International Monetary and Financial Law the Global Crisis (Oxford University Press 2010), “La Independencia del Banco Central: Aspectos Legales” (IEP, BCRP, and UP 2011), and “The Right to Property in Human Rights and Investment Law: A Latin American Perspective of an Unavoidable Connection” (World Trade Institute 2013).
Aditya Narain is Deputy Director of the Monetary and Capital Markets Department of the IMF, where he oversees the work on financial supervision and regulation and fintech, as well as its overall technical assistance function. In his IMF career, he has worked extensively with IMF member countries in promoting financial sector reforms. In this regard, he has led several Financial Sector Assessment Program (FSAP) missions (including to the United States, Canada, and Malaysia), conducted assessments of bank supervision in several other FSAPs (including China), and has led technical assistance missions on a range of financial sector topics around the world. He has been closely involved with various international regulatory reform initiatives and currently represents the IMF on the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, in addition to attending the Plenary meetings of the FSB. He also serves as the Vice-Chair of the FIRST Initiative and as a Member of the Board of the Toronto Centre. He joined the IMF after working at the Reserve Bank of India, where he was Chief General Manager of the Department of Banking Supervision. He holds master’s degrees in physics from Delhi University and in public administration from Harvard University.
Myrte Meijer Timmerman Thijssen started her career in the Legal Service of the Netherlands Central Bank (Supervision & Regulation Department). She was involved inter alia in the setup of the national resolution authority within the Netherlands Central Bank. In 2015, she joined the Single Resolution Board, and since then has been working in its Legal Services, providing legal advice in crisis cases and dealing with litigation before the Appeal Panel and the Court of Justice of the European Union. She completed her law studies at the University of Amsterdam and New York University.
José Viñals has been the Group Chairman of the Standard Chartered Bank since the end of 2016. Between 2009 and 2016, he was Financial Counsellor and Director of the Monetary and Capital Markets Department of the IMF. During that time, he was a member of the FSB, representing the IMF. His previous professional career has been closely tied to the Central Bank of Spain, where he served as Deputy Governor after holding successive positions. He has also held the positions of Chairman of the European Central Bank International Relations Committee and Chairman of Spain’s Deposit Guarantee Funds.
He has been a member of the Bank for International Settlements Committee on the Global Financial System, the European Central Bank Monetary Policy Committee, and the high-level group appointed by the president of the European Commission to examine economic challenges in the European Union. He was a member of the EU Economic and Financial Committee and a board member of the Spanish Securities Authority, the Comisión Nacional del Mercado de Valores.
He holds a Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University and is a former faculty member in the Economics Department at Stanford University. His awards include the Premio Rey Jaime I (King James I Prize) in economics.
Rhoda Weeks-Brown is General Counsel and Director of the IMF’s Legal Department. She advises the IMF’s Executive Board, management, staff, and country membership on all legal aspects of the IMF’s operations, including its lending, regulatory, and advisory functions. Over her career at the IMF, she has led the Legal Department’s work on a wide range of significant policy and country matters. She has written articles and many IMF board papers on all aspects of the law of the IMF and co-taught a Tulane University seminar on that topic.
Ms. Weeks-Brown has also served as Deputy Director in the IMF’s Communications Department, where she led IMF communications and outreach in Africa, Asia, and Europe; played a key role in the transformation of the IMF’s communications strategy; and led IMF strategic policy communications on key legal and financial topics.
Ms. Weeks-Brown has a J.D. from Harvard Law School and a B.A. in economics (summa cum laude) from Howard University. Before joining the IMF, she worked in Skadden’s Washington, DC, office. She is a member of the Bar in New York, Massachusetts, and the District of Columbia, and a member of the Supreme Court Bar. Ms. Weeks-Brown serves on the Board of TalentNomics, Inc., a nonprofit organization focused on developing women leaders globally.
Mehmet Siddik Yurtcicek is Senior Counsel and Manager at BaFin Consultancy where he consults businesses on banking and financial services. Before that, he worked at the Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency of Turkey, where he served as Head of the Legal Affairs Department and coordinated the FSB team. Dr. Yurtcicek was a member of the Technical Committee of the Islamic Financial Services Board and worked as Consulting Counsel in the Legal Department of the IMF. He has given lectures on banking resolution and Islamic banking and is a frequent speaker at many national and international conferences. He earned a law degree, a master’s degree in EU law, and a Ph.D. in private law from Marmara University; and he has an LL.M. in banking and finance law from the Queen Mary University of London. His book, Electronic Money from the Legal Perspective, was published in June 2013 (and a second edition in May 2015).
Mehmet Sefik Yurtcicek is an Islamic finance consultant and Middle East specialist. He holds a master’s degree from Georgetown University’s Center for Contemporary Arab Studies and a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Istanbul University. He worked as a career diplomat at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Turkey, where he served in the departments of Central Asia and Middle East, as well as in the embassies of Damascus/Syria and Tripoli/Libya, focusing on the political and economic aspects of bilateral and multilateral relations with countries of the region. Throughout these assignments, he analyzed the political and economic structures of most of the Islamic world. Moreover, as a project director at the Turkic Council, he coordinated relations and joint projects with the Islamic Development Bank, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, and World Customs Organization. Mr. Yurtcicek currently consults on compliance (including AML/CFT), financial due diligence, and valuation.
Chiara Zilioli has worked for the European integration project, in particular for the monetary union, for much of her career. She earned an LL.M. from Harvard Law School and a Ph.D. from the European University Institute. She worked in the Legal Service of the EU Council, where she started in 1989, and moved to the European Monetary Institute in 1995 and to the European Central Bank in 1998, where she was appointed first as Head of Division and then as Director General of Legal Services (General Counsel).
Ms. Zilioli has been appointed Professor at the Law Faculty of the J-W Goethe Universität Frankfurt. She has published three books and several articles, mainly on the position of the European Central Bank within the EU institutional framework and on the functions of the European Central Bank. For several years, she has been a lecturer at the Institute for Law and Finance of the J-W Goethe Universität Frankfurt and at the Collegio Europeo di Parma in Italy. In 2012, she taught a course at the Academy of European Law of the European University Institute. She is a member of the Italian Bar.