Our 2026 speakers

Amar Ahluwalia

Co-Founder and CEO, OneVest

Amar Ahluwalia is the CEO & Co-Founder of OneVest. He brings a long history of executive and leadership roles across financial services, fintech, asset management, and capital markets. Prior to OneVest, Amar held executive and leadership positions at Coast Capital, OnDeck, and IHS Markit, and began his career at BMO Capital Markets. He holds a Bachelor's degree in Economics from York University. Amar has also served on the board of the Canadian Lenders Association and as a fintech policy advisor for the British Columbia Securities Commission. 

Tess Bloch

Co-Founder and COO, Spade

Tess Bloch is the co-founder and Chief Operating Officer of Spade, the only transaction enrichment and merchant intelligence platform powering use cases across the payments value chain, from decisioning to loyalty to user experience. Before co-founding Spade, Tess led operations at Pinwheel and consulted at McKinsey & Company in London across payments and private equity. She got her start in fintech as a Venmo intern at Stanford, an internship that turned into a full-time role and gave her firsthand conviction that merchant intelligence would become critical infrastructure for the future of finance. Today, Spade's data and AI platform serves leading banks and fintechs like Citizens, Stripe, Cash App, and Bilt across authorization, rewards attribution, and analytics. 

Michael Denham

Executive Vice-President and Vice-Chair, National Bank of Canada

Michael Denham is Executive Vice-President and Vice Chair of National Bank of Canada. He is responsible for developing strategic orientations, leading key client relationships and priority projects. His current focus is integrating the Bank’s recent acquisition of Canadian Western Bank which brings him to Alberta very regularly. Mr. Denham sits on National Bankʼs Senior Leadership Team. 

Michael joined the Bank in 2021. Prior, he was President and CEO of BDC Business Development Bank of Canada), where he was instrumental in doubling the commercial franchise across Canada, advocating for small and medium-size business owners, and supporting the growth of entrepreneurs at every stage and across various industries. He had a particular focus on technology-based startups and venture capital. Under his leadership, BDC set up its partnership with NACCA (National Aboriginal Capital Corporation Associations) and worked closely with communities across the country. 

Prior to that, Michael held senior executive roles, including at Accenture, where he was President and CEO for Canada, CGI, Bombardier, and McKinsey. In addition to his professional activities, Mr. Denham serves on the Boards of the McGill University Health Centre Foundation 
and Endeavor Canada. Mr. Denham also serves as a mentor to entrepreneurs. He holds a Masterʼs degree in Economy from the London School of Economics and Political Science LSE) and a Bachelorʼs degree in Public and International Affairs from Princeton University. 

Holger Kormann

President and CEO, Symcor

As President and Chief Executive Officer, Holger Kormann is responsible for the strategic management, direction and growth of Symcor’s operations across Canada. An innovative and hands-on change-agent, Holger is a visionary with an exceptional track record of shaping successful business strategies and driving growth.  

Prior to joining Symcor, Holger served as President of ADP Canada for eight years, where he was responsible for positioning the company as the partner of choice in the human resources technology and outsourcing markets. With over two decades of experience spanning technology, operations, and sales, Holger has held progressively senior positions at organizations including Atos International and Siemens. 

Holger earned a Bachelor of Applied Sciences degree from Hamburg University of Applied Sciences and an MBA from the University of Hamburg in Germany. With a wide range of interests, Holger is a curious traveler, an avid car enthusiast and a hobby real estate developer. He enjoys biking, running, tennis and spending quality time with family at his home base in Oakville, Ontario. 

Parna Sabet-Stephenson

Partner, Leader of Financial Services & Technology, Gowling WLG

As the leader of Gowling WLG’s Financial Services & Technology Group (FSxT), Parna Sabet-Stephenson is a trusted legal advisor to organizations across the financial services and technology sectors. She is widely recognized, both nationally and internationally, for her deep expertise in technology law and fintech. A bilingual and highly engaged practitioner, Parna is a frequent contributor to industry and legal forums, where she shares her insights and thought leadership.

Guy Shahar

Founder and CEO, Blee

Guy Shahar is the CEO and founder of Blee, a category-defining platform built to streamline marketing content compliance in highly regulated industries—especially financial services. With deep domain expertise across marketing operations, legal compliance, and financial services strategy, Guy founded Blee to address a critical but overlooked pain point: how marketing content is reviewed, approved, and archived in line with regulatory standards. 

Before launching Blee in 2022, Guy led Strategy, Planning, and Operations for Adobe's B2B products, and previously headed digital strategy engagements for Adobe's Fortune 500 clients—most notably banks, insurance companies, and asset managers. Earlier in his career, he held senior marketing roles at various startups, served as a strategy consultant at McKinsey & Company, and practiced corporate law and regulatory compliance after graduating law school.

Abraham A. Tachjian

Chief Regulatory Affairs, Brim Financials

Abraham is a leader in financial services with globally recognized expertise in open banking. Over the span of his career, he has worked with financial institutions and regulators with respect to cutting-edge technological changes in banking, new business models and disruption from innovation. 

In March 2022, the Government of Canada named him the country’s Open Banking Lead. He was tasked with the mandate to empower Canadians and businesses with greater control over their financial data and to be better equipped to manage their finances. He established the foundation for Canada’s open banking system with a framework that is being implemented through legislation. 

He was previously a Director at PwC where he heads the firm’s Canadian open banking practice. Before joining PwC, he was one of the founders of Mox, a digital bank in Hong Kong built from scratch which has since gained prominence in the market. Prior to that, he was a director in digital banking in Singapore where he was responsible for the implementation of emerging technologies as well as making banking simpler and more intuitive. 

Abraham is a frequent speaker at conferences as well as to board of directors and regulators on emerging topics in financial services.  As a common law and civil law qualified lawyer, he brings a multidisciplinary approach that bridges the gap between banking, technology and law.

Peter Zaffino

Chairman and CEO, AIG

Peter Zaffino is Executive Chairman of American International Group, Inc. (AIG), a leading global insurance company that provides a broad range of products and services for businesses and individuals around the world.  

Mr. Zaffino served as Chief Executive Officer of AIG from 2021 to June 1, 2026 and Chairman of the Board of Directors since 2022. He joined the company in 2017 as Global Chief Operating Officer.

During his tenure as CEO, Mr. Zaffino led AIG through a remarkable turnaround against the backdrop of significant macroeconomic headwinds. Through disciplined underwriting, AIG reversed years of substantial underwriting losses and delivered five consecutive years of underwriting profitability through his entire tenure as CEO, returning the company to market leadership and significantly improved financial strength. Under Mr. Zaffino’s leadership, AIG built a strong culture of underwriting excellence, divested non-core businesses, invested in future-focused enterprise initiatives, modernized its end-to-end operations and technology infrastructure and solidified the balance sheet for strategic flexibility, sustainable and profitable earnings growth. He has been recognized as a commercial leader in the understanding and implementation of AI. 

With more than 35 years of experience, Mr. Zaffino previously held executive leadership roles at Marsh & McLennan Companies (MMC), where he was Chairman of MMC’s Risk and Insurance businesses, which included Marsh and Guy Carpenter. Mr. Zaffino also served as Chief Executive Officer of Marsh and, prior to Marsh, as President & Chief Executive Officer of Guy Carpenter. Prior to MMC, he held senior roles within GE Capital, where he specialized in alternative risk reinsurance. 

Mr. Zaffino earned his bachelor’s degree from Boston College and holds an MBA in Finance from New York University’s Leonard N. Stern School of Business. He serves on the Board of Directors of The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research and is a Trustee of the Hospital for Special Surgery.