Advisory Board

Session: PANEL DISCUSSION- Utilising impact investment strategies to minimise risk, promote impact and increase returns

Kylie has worked in Australia and internationally at the intersection of mainstream capital markets, impact investment and philanthropy since 2004 and she is committed to mobilising capital to solve environmental and social challenges.

Session: PANEL DISCUSSION- Critical trends, strategies and lessons from across the investment sector

Zarmeen Pavri is a transformational and values- based leader and have over 28 years’ experience in the funds management, responsible investment, impact investing and international development sectors. She is an accomplished C-suite executive and NED, with a proven track record in growing successful organisations and now work solely in applying her lived and work experience towards creating positive impact within the investment sector.

After leaving the traditional funds management world more than 8 year ago, Zarmeen explored how investment can be used to create dual returns -financial returns and impact returns. She now dedicates her life towards being as impactful as she can be at every level of her corporate and personal life. She is a rare breed of the hybrid investment professional and work at multiple levels of the investment ecosystem. She works at the 'market building' level, educating institutional Asset owners on how to view their portfolios using an 'impact lens' and wear also various Governance hats as an NED that can influence at the Board level & Investment committee level. She works as a 'market enabler' through the ESG and Impact Advisory work, to integrate impact into the investment decision making processes or to help design new funds that can create real world impact. Lastly, she works as an market participant, being an Investment Manager running a Climate Tech fund, deploying capital to climate tech ventures.

Being the alchemist, disrupter, translator and bridge builder, she is passionate about transforming the capital and investor markets to being a force for good and know how to unlock potential and create long-term value creation, which enables prosperity for all stakeholders, society and planet.

Zarmeen loves working off a clean sheet of paper, empowering others to create something from nothing and this is coupled with all the commercial experience and investment experience, that facilitates growth in good ways and hence her passion to also mentor emerging leaders, start-ups and in particular, as a DEI advocate.

She works with integrity and ethics and work hard to collaborate unique talents and super powers and form a collective intelligence far greater than working in silos.

She believes that if you want to address real world problems which are systemic issues then be prepared to break and disrupt the current systems, do things differently and use creativity to reimagine a new world where everyone can create a healthy and thriving planet and society!

Session: Investment industry outlook 2023 – navigating the trends and changes

Kylie-Anne Richards serves as the Deputy Chief Investment Officer and is a Fortlake Asset Management Board member. With extensive domestic and international industry experience, she has held positions such as Head of Financial Engineering for the Asia Pacific at Macquarie Group in Hong Kong, Head of Indexation and Quantitative Trading Research at CLSA in Sydney, and Director and Portfolio Manager at QTR Capital, a proprietary trading business.

Kylie-Anne is a tenured academic at the University of Technology Sydney, focusing on research and teaching in sustainable finance, green finance, ESG, and high-frequency finance. She has developed and lectures Sustainable Finance subjects in the Master of Finance, MBA, Executive MBA, Master of Financial Planning, and Microcredential programs. An internationally published academic, her papers have appeared in journals such as the 'International Journal of Financial Engineering' and 'Statistical Inference for Stochastic Processes.'

She completed her PhD at the University of NSW (UNSW) School of Mathematics and Statistics and was awarded the QRSLab Boronia Managed Funds PhD Scholarship in 2011. Kylie-Anne also holds a Master of Finance (Financial Engineering) from The University of Hong Kong, a Bachelor of Science (Mathematics and Statistics), and a Bachelor of Commerce (Finance) from The University of Melbourne.

Session: Practical, real world strategies to close the gender pay gap

Session: PANEL DISCUSSION- Critical trends, strategies and lessons from across the investment sector

Dr Laura Ryan is Head of Research at Ardea IM and is responsible for both the Portfolio Research and Client Solutions teams.

The Portfolio Research team is responsible for developing value-added trade recommendations to drive portfolio performance and improve client outcomes. The Client Solutions team undertakes independent quantitative research to help clients solve investment problems.

Laura is an internationally published academic with papers appearing in ‘The Journal of Portfolio Management’ and ‘The Journal of Forecasting’, ‘The Journal of Investing’ and ‘The Journal of Retirement’ among others.

Previously, Laura was Senior Vice President (Quantitative Research) and a member of the Australian senior management team at PIMCO. With 24 years investment experience, Laura’s other roles include Manager of Quantitative Strategy at Commonwealth Bank, Quantitative Manager at AMP Capital and Lecturer in Statistics at the Australian National University (ANU).

Laura holds a Ph.D. in statistics from the ANU, a Master of Quantitative Finance from the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) and an Honours degree in Actuarial Studies from the ANU. She is also an Adjunct Associate Professor at UTS.

Session: The rise of women in investment – challenges, opportunities & strengthening the industry

Kathy Walsh is a Finance Professor and the Associate Dean (Research and Innovation) at the UTS Business School and has a critical role in fostering a vibrant research culture of rigorous, relevant and impactful research. Kathy is widely recognised for her pioneering research in the field of Chinese capital markets, with a particular focus on the internationalisation of the Renminbi (RMB). Her work explores the motivations behind China's push to promote the use of the RMB in international trade and investment and its efforts to digitise the currency. She also analyses the implications of these developments and the challenges and opportunities for global markets. Her insights have helped guide financial institutions in their strategic planning and risk management efforts.

Kathy holds a PhD in finance from the Australian Graduate School of Management and a first-class Honours Degree in Finance from Curtin University. Her academic career spans over two decades, during which she has held various academic roles such as the ANU, Sydney University and UNSW. She has also served as the Research Director for the Centre for International Finance and Regulation and as the President of FIRN. Prior to her academic career, Kathy worked for 10 years in the financial services sector and this practical experience has greatly informed her research.