The Regulators 2024

Christian has been with Te Putea Matua since 2019. Prior to his appointment as Deputy Governor/General Manager Financial Stability Group, Christian was the Assistant Governor and General Manager of Economics, Financial Markets and Banking.

Christian was also part of the team that established Harbour Asset Management, which was awarded Morningstar New Zealand Fund Manager of the Year in 2014, 2016 and 2017.

Before this, Christian spent 9 years at the Bank of England, where he held senior positions including Private Secretary to the Deputy Governor, Chief Manager of Sterling Markets and Head of Market Intelligence.

Christian graduated from the University of Canterbury with a Master of Commerce (Hons) majoring in Economics.

Therese McCarthy Hockey was appointed Executive Board Member of APRA on 31 October 2022, with responsibility for the banking sector. 

Ms McCarthy Hockey joined APRA in January 2018 as the Executive General Manager: Strategy and Chief Risk Officer. In December 2019, she was made Executive Director of the Banking Division, responsible for the prudential supervision of all authorised deposit-taking institutions operating in Australia and for the functional domains of market risk, credit risk, credit analytics, liquidity risk and capital management. 

Ms McCarthy Hockey’s experience spans Australia, the United Kingdom and Europe.  Prior to joining APRA, she was Deutsche Bank’s Treasury Deputy Group Head and Global Chief Operating Officer based in London. Ms McCarthy Hockey has also served on the Boards of Deutsche’s UK subsidiaries including the Regulated Bank. 

Ms McCarthy Hockey holds a Bachelor in Mathematics, a Bachelor in Economics and Finance, and a Master of Applied Finance degree from Macquarie University. She is also a graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.

Ms McCarthy Hockey is an APRA representative of the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision and sit on the Council of Financial Regulators and Trans-Tasman Banking Council.

Dr Brad Jones is Assistant Governor (Financial System) at the Reserve Bank of Australia and serves as Deputy Chair of the Payments System Board.

Brad has oversight of the Bank's payments policy work, including on the future of money. He is also responsible for the Bank's work on financial stability and production of the twice-yearly Financial Stability Review. He represents the Bank as a member on the Council of Financial Regulators, and in international fora at the Financial Stability Board and the Basel Committee for Banking Supervision. He is a member of the Advisory Board of the Institute of Global Finance and a signatory to The Banking and Finance Oath.

Dr Jones joined the RBA in 2018, first serving as the Head of International Department before taking over as the Head of Economic Analysis Department. He was appointed Assistant Governor in 2022.

Before joining the Bank, Brad was at the International Monetary Fund in Washington DC for five years, where he served as senior advisor on the international financial system in the Monetary and Capital Markets Department. Prior to that, he held senior macroeconomic research and investment responsibilities for just under a decade at Deutsche Bank in London and Hong Kong.

Brad graduated with a PhD in finance and first class honours in economics, is a graduate member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and served for five years as a Fellow at the University of Cambridge Judge Business School.

Alan commenced as an ASIC Commissioner for a five-year term on 20 November 2023.

He has more than 20 years’ experience in consumer protection, social services, law reform and justice in the public and not-for-profit sectors.

Most recently, Alan was the CEO at CHOICE where he represented the interests of Australian consumers for more than 11 years.

Earlier, Alan was the Executive Director of the Australian Law Reform Commission, the CEO of Legal Aid New South Wales, Chair of the National Legal Assistance Advisory Body, and Executive Director of the NSW Council of Social Service.

From 2016 to 2017, Alan was a member of the panel for the Ramsay Review, which led to the establishment of the Australian Financial Complaints Authority and Compensation Scheme of Last Resort.

He holds degrees in Arts and Law from the University of NSW, an Executive MBA from the Australian Graduate School of Management, and is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.

Mr Brendan Thomas commenced his 5-year appointment as AUSTRAC Chief Executive Officer (CEO) on 29 January 2024.

As AUSTRAC CEO, Brendan leads Australia’s financial intelligence unit and anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing (AML/CTF) regulator.

AUSTRAC’s regulation hardens the financial sector against criminal exploitation and its intelligence provides crucial information to its national security, domestic and international law enforcement partners.

Brendan is AUSTRAC’s representative on the ACIC Board, the Serious Financial Crime Taskforce CEO Board, and the Criminal Justice and Law Enforcement Forum. In view of AUSTRAC’s role as a member of the National Intelligence Community (NIC), Brendan is also responsible for agency head-level engagement with the Office of National Intelligence and other NIC members.

Brendan is a Wiradjuri man, with significant experience in leading, designing and delivering major public services, especially in the criminal and civil justice systems in NSW, and in leading organisational reform.

Ahead of his commencement with AUSTRAC, Brendan served as a Deputy Secretary at the NSW Department of Communities and Justice, with responsibility for implementing major changes to reduce the over-representation of the Indigenous population in the NSW criminal and child protection systems. Prior to this, Brendan was the CEO of Legal Aid NSW and was formerly the Deputy Secretary at the NSW Department of Justice.

Brendan has a Bachelor of Arts from Macquarie University and is a fellow of the Australian and New Zealand School of Government.

Amrita Jebamoney leads PwC’s National Risk practice, specialising in the financial services industry and brings over 20 years’ experience in governance, risk and compliance and regulatory advice to large multinational organisations.

Amrita is passionate about helping organisations become more resilient and driving strategic, operational, and financial performance through better risk management.

She has worked with organisations helping them to get the full value from their strategy through consideration of risk and associated opportunities in strategy development and execution and has led a number of large-scale projects where she has helped her clients effectively manage the needs of key internal and external stakeholders (including regulatory bodies) to solve complex risk and compliance issues.

Amrita’s experience includes:

• Advising financial services institutions on governance, risk and compliance matters and helping them to uplift their risk management processes including their compliance with regulatory and legislative requirements and understanding the strategic risks involved.
• Assisting clients with regulatory change and response including market trends and issues around governance, risk and compliance.
• Dealing with industry regulators through lobbying responses, investigations and Enforceable Undertakings and leading related Independent Expert reviews.
• Designing and assessing the implementation and effectiveness of governance, risk and compliance activities and processes that help to effectively manage business risks.
• Delivering large scale remediation programs across banking, insurance and wealth management sectors,  responsible for leading multiple complex work streams and helping develop reimbursement strategies, proactively respond to regulator expectations, and work through various risks and issues relating to the customer remediation processes.
• Reviewing and uplifting core business processes to identify gaps / issues and improve process efficiency, effectiveness, compliance with key requirements with a focus on cost out and productivity.