The European Exchanges Summit

Sebastijan Hrovatin

DG Internal Market and Services, European Commission

Biography

Sebastijan Hrovatin joined the Commission on 1st September 2005. He holds a first degree in economics from the University of Ljubljana, Slovenia (1999) and an MSc in Finance and Economics from the London School of Economics and Political Science (2000). Prior to joining the Commission he worked for nearly four years for Fiat in Italy, first as an economist and then as chief economist.

Gabor Kutas

Member of the Board, Quote MTF

Biography

Mr Gabor Kutas is co-owner and board member at QUOTE MTF, a new European alternative equities trading platform. Along with QUOTE MTF, he also runs his own capital market consultancy firm, advising brokerage companies, asset managers and pension funds on product development and sales strategy.

Previously, he headed business development and communication at Budapest Stock Exchange, where he was responsible for product and sales strategy, statistics, research and marketing. Earlier he worked in sell side positions in investment banks in London, and in sales at Xetra, Deutsche Börse’s cash market segment in Frankfurt.

Mr Kutas sits on the Hungarian Mifid Consultation Panel and serves as a non-executive director for AXA Premium Pension Fund in Hungary.

Mr Kutas received his MSc in International Finance with distinction from CERAM ESC, France and his MPhil from Université de Nice, France. Earlier, he studied at the University of Economics Vienna, Austria and at the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology, UK.

Mr Kutas collects Central European art from the first half of the 20^th century.

Rainer Riess

Managing Director, Deutsche Börse

Biography

Rainer Riess is Member of the Management Board of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and Managing Director XETRA Market Development at Deutsche Börse. He is responsible for sales, business development as well as issuer and investor markets of all cash market activities of Deutsche Börse AG, comprising of the electronic trading system Xetra^® and the floor of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange. Currently, more than 250 member institutions from 19 countries use the Xetra system. Altogether, the cash market of Deutsche Börse comprises of more than 380,000 stocks, bonds, exchange-traded and actively managed funds, certificates and warrants.

Rainer Riess holds a Masters of Arts in Economics from the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt and a Master of Business Administration from the University of Miami. He is a former Fulbright scholar.

Mark Howarth

Chief Executive Officer, CHI-X Europe

Biography

Mark Howarth was appointed Interim Chief Executive Officer, Chi-X Europe, in March 2009. Mark joined Chi-X Europe from Chi-X APAC, where he served as Chief Operating Officer of the Asian business since May 2008, covering all of Chi-X's regional businesses in Australia, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, and ASEAN.  He previously spent two years as CEO of Thomson Financial in Asia Pacific, based in Hong Kong.  His professional background is in institutional equities, starting out with Merrill Lynch and UBS in London, followed by a series of roles at Instinet in Europe, Japan, and Hong Kong.

Cees Vermaas

Executive Vice President, NYSE Euronext

Biography

Cees Vermaas joined the Euronext Cash Markets as Head of Cash Market Netherlands in December 2001. In May 2009, he was appointed Executive Vice President, Head of European Cash Markets with responsibility for NYSE Euronext’s European cash trading business, including equities, fixed income, operations, projects and business development.

As part of his previous responsibilities, Cees managed all the commercial aspects of securities trading across the Euronext locations in Europe, and was also responsible for delivering the global cross-selling synergies arising from the April 2004 merger of NYSE and Euronext. The primary objective of his new role is to expand the Exchange’s strong equities franchise in Europe.

Cees began his career in 1992 as Head of IT for a well-known Dutch franchise company within the Philips Group. At that time he developed and implemented an innovative electronic data communication network (EDI) and assisted in the development of a successful franchise formula for the entertainment industry in the Benelux region. He first came into contact with the banking and insurance sector in 1997.

Between 1995 and 2001, Cees held a variety of positions in The Netherlands, ranging from Commercial Director of IT firm IMC Business Applications to Management Consultant for both Getronics and CMG Logica. Between 2000 and 2001, he was Programme Manager, responsible for the changeover from Euronext’s Dutch equity quote-driven market model to Euronext’s current order-driven model.

Cees graduated in technical business administration from the Institute of Technology in Rijswijk, The Netherlands.

David Lawton

Head of Markets Policy, Financial Services Authority

Biography

David is Head of Markets Infrastructure and Policy at the Financial Services Authority, where his responsibilities encompass the supervision of the UK's exchanges, other trading platforms, and clearing and settlement services, and both primary and secondary markets policy issues. The Department also takes responsibility for the FSA's capital markets sector team. Key current challenges include: ensuring that the implementation of the markets aspects of MiFID proceeds smoothly, both domestically and, working with European counterparts, across Europe; and the regulatory consequences of greater global integration and competition in primary and secondary markets.

Before joining the FSA in January 2005, David spent nearly 20 years at Her Majesty's Treasury, latterly as Head of Capital Markets and Governance, with responsibility for the Department’s policy towards securities and wholesale financial markets, prudential capital standards, accounting and auditing issues, corporate governance and company law. David is an economist by training, with degrees from Cambridge University and the London School of Economics.