Yan Liu
Deputy General Counsel
IMF
Ms. Yan Liu is Deputy General Counsel in the Legal Department of the International Monetary Fund. She has advised on all aspects of the IMF’s operations, including its surveillance over member countries’ economies and financial and technical assistance to its members. She currently leads the IMF’s work to help member countries strengthen their legal frameworks to regulate the financial sector and respond to the opportunities and challenges posed by technological changes, and to contribute to the development of international standards for financial regulation. She also oversees the Legal Department’s work on the development and implementation of the IMF polices on lending, sovereign debt restructuring, bank resolution, and corporate and household insolvency and debt enforcement. Ms. Liu frequently lectures and publishes on the law of the IMF and other issues of international financial law.
Monica Sah
Partner
Clifford Chance
Monica is a partner in the Financial Regulation Group. Previously, she was a Managing Director at Morgan Stanley and Head of Legal for International Wealth Management. Monica advises global financial institutions (asset managers and sell side) on a full range of legal and regulatory issues, including: establishment of new regulated entities, regulatory reform and implementation (e.g. AIFMD, UCITSV, ALMD5, SRD2 and MiFID2/R), financial product structuring, custody issues, expanding and maintaining a multi- product and jurisdictional platform, initial margin product development, governance and financial institution M&A. She is a leading advisor on Brexit structuring issues for asset managers, banks and dealers and on FinTech, cryptoassets and cryptocustody issues for cryptoasset issuers, crypto exchanges and crypto custodians.
Carine Antoine Chartouni
Deputy Division Chief
IMF
Carine is the Deputy Division Chief of the Financial and Fiscal Law Division of the IMF’s Legal Department, overseeing the work on central banking, financial sector, public financial management, and tax, covering core areas and new ones such as gender, Fintech, and climate. The latter entails supporting the IMF member countries in the design of their legal frameworks in the context of IMF surveillance, lending, and capacity development, and contributing to the formulation of legal policies. Previously, Ms. Chartouni was an Executive Director and Head of the Compliance Department at the Central Bank of Lebanon where she also held other positions including as Deputy General Counsel of the Legal Department. Ms. Chartouni has also worked as a Corporate Lawyer with Dewey & Leboeuf LLP in Dubai. She holds an International Executive MBA from ESCP Europe, an LL.M in International Law from Temple University, and an LL.B in Civil Law from the LA Sagesse University. Ms. Chartouni is the recipient of the award granted by the Lebanese parliamentarians to leading women in the public sector. Ms. Chartouni is also a member of the Beirut and the New York Bar Associations.
Diego Ballon Ossio
Partner
Clifford Chance
Diego Ballon Ossio is one of the partners spearheading our Fintech offering out of London. His broad regulatory practice spans across the entire spectrum of non-contentious financial services regulation covering trading, custody and settlement of traditional investments and digital assets as well as strategic advice to regulatory authorities on the design and development of new regulatory frameworks.
Marianne Bechara
Senior Counsel
IMF
Ms. Bechara is a Senior Counsel in the Fiscal and Financial Law Division of the IMF’s Legal Department. She provides legal advice on legal reforms related to Fintech, central banking, regulation of financial and banking institutions as well as payments and payment systems. She currently co-supervises the Fintech work of the legal department under the guidance of the deputy general counsel. Prior to relocating to the U.S., Ms. Bechara was a senior counsel assisting the General Counsel of the Lebanese Central Bank. Ms. Bechara contributed to many publications analyzing the intersection of the law and Fintech. She is an attorney admitted to practice law in New York, U.S.
Juliana Bolzani
Senior Counsel
IMF
Juliana is Senior Counsel in the Fiscal and Financial Law Division of the IMF’s Legal Department. Before joining the Fund, Ms. Bolzani was senior counsel at the Central Bank of Brazil, advising on monetary policy, management of foreign reserves, payment systems, digital assets, and central bank digital currencies. Ms. Bolzani is admitted to practice law in Brazil and New York and is a member of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators (CIArb). She holds an LL.M. degree in international law and international dispute resolution from the University of London, as well as LL.M. and S.J.D. degrees from Duke University, where her research focused on central banking and financial regulation.
Simon Crown
Partner
Clifford Chance
Simon Crown specialises in financial regulation, with particular focus on funds and asset management and M&A and reorganisations involving financial institutions.
Simon also has expertise in the areas of regulatory capital, client assets, transaction services (such as the regulation of payments) and European Directives relating to financial services.
James Dadford
Senior Associate
Clifford Chance
James is a senior associate in the Dubai Corporate/M&A and regulatory practice with a focus on fintech. He regularly advises on strategic regulatory transactions in the MENA market in a wide variety of industries and with joint ventures, corporate structuring and regulatory establishment projects, in addition to acting in a leading role on strategic and high-profile M&A transactions.
James advises global corporates, bank and non-bank financial institutions, and his expertise includes financial services, commercial contracts and virtual asset regulation across each of the onshore UAE, ADGM and DIFC. James has a wide range of experience in digital assets, including in relation to central bank digital currency implementation projects.
Adrian Dorel Dumitrescu Pasecinic
Senior Consulting Counsel
IMF
Adrian is a Senior Consulting Counsel in the FF Division. A national of Romania, Mr. Dumitrescu Pasecinic comes to us from the European Commission where he worked as Legal Counsel focusing on Monetary and Central Bank Law and Digital Currency. Prior to this Mr. Dumitrescu Pasecinic worked as a Legal Officer in the Legal Department of the European Banking Authority. Additionally, Mr. Dumitrescu Pasecinic held such positions as a Counsellor to the Legal Department, as Head of the European and International Law Unit, Senior Legal Counsel and Legal Counsel at the National Bank of Romania. Mr. Dumitrescu Pasecinic received his Masters degree from the University of Bucharest, Faculty of Law, Romania, and his PhD from the West University of Timisoara, Romania. Mr. Dumitrescu Pasecinic can be contacted via email at adumitrescupaseci@imf.org.
Alessandro Gullo
Assistant General Counsel
IMF
Alessandro is Assistant General Counsel at the Legal Department of the International Monetary Fund, where he is leading the team of the Fund’s lawyers working on monetary, financial and fiscal law in IMF’s member countries. He has advised a wide range of countries across the globe on the design and implementation of their fiscal and financial legal frameworks, also in the context of the IMF’s financial assistance. In his current capacity, he is contributing to the IMF’s digitalization agenda through analytical papers on the various forms of private and public digital money, and country advice on legal reforms in this area. He served in various committees of international organizations contributing to international standards, particularly in the financial sector area. Mr. Gullo published on banking and fiscal law matters, including most recently on the legal reforms adopted by countries in response to the pandemic. Before joining the IMF in 2008, he worked for international law firms, in Europe and in the United States.
Young Kim
Counsel
Clifford Chance
Young Kim has extensive experience advising financial institutions on corporate matters and banking regulation, with a particular focus on fintech offerings, deposits, payment services and digital assets, including tokenized instruments and digital currencies. His practical experience includes advising on retail, private wealth and commercial bank offerings and extends to ensuring compliance with US banking laws, including from the Federal Reserve Board, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and New York State Department of Financial Services.
Marian Scheele
Senior Counsel
Clifford Chance
Marian Scheele specialises in the financial regulatory and legal aspects of financial institutions, with a focus on Fintechs (incl. banks, EMIs, PSPs, platforms, crypto and blockchain companies). She leads the Fintech Team and co-leads the Tech Team of Clifford Chance Amsterdam. Her expertise includes advising on licensing and registration, governance, structure and organisation and other ongoing license requirements. She is frequently involved in corporate restructurings and M&A transactions including IPOs. She contributes to the implementation of EU financial regulatory law in Dutch national law.
Alex Tollast
Counsel
Clifford Chance
Alexander is a Counsel in Clifford Chance's Paris office, practicing English and French law in the firm's Global Financial Markets practice. He has a broad practice specialising in debt capital markets, banking, structured finance and financial regulation. He has particular expertise in matters related to FinTech, advising on projects relating to the use of DLT in the financial markets.