On Friday, 3 December 2021, the ILF hosted its 2nd Virtual Alumni Global Networking Event. The evening began with a welcome address by Prof. Dr. Andreas Cahn, ILF Founder and Executive Director where he greeted ILF alumni from all across the globe and was happy to see many of them again. He also extended the first invitation to our alumni for the 20th Anniversary Celebrations of the Institute for Law and Finance, which will be hosted in Frankfurt on the weekend of 10 June 2022.
Following Prof. Dr. Cahn, the ILF had the honor to welcome two external speakers. The first was our own ILF lecturer Mr. Patrick Kenadjian, Senior Counsel of Davis Polk, who gave our audience a brief overview on his upcoming conference entitled "Data, Digitalization, Decentralized Finance and Central Bank Digital Currencies: The Future of Banking and Money". The themes of this upcoming conference could not be more current and the ILF looks forward to hearing more on these topics at Mr. Kenadjian’s conference on 18 January 2022.
Our second external speaker was Prof. Dr. Alexander Thiele of BSP Business & Law School, Berlin. Prof. Dr. Thiele presented an engaging perspective on the European Central Bank’s role and its independence which covered issues relating to political, practical and financial independence. His discussed the challenges that the ECB is currently facing and made legal arguments and proposals on how potential solutions could be reached.
Next, Ms. Jennifer Barnett, ILF Alumni Manager, who moderated the event, introduced our three alumni speakers. Our first alumni speaker was Mr. Lutfi Ziad Kharuf (Class of 2010), Partner at Best Best & Krieger LLP in San Diego. Mr. Kharuf detailed his career since completing his studies at the ILF and graduating into the midst of the financial crisis. He described his career trajectory through public finance work and was happy that his work as a lawyer had made contributions to the wider community.
Mr. Gerasimos “Gerry” Kounadis (Class of 2011) was our second alumni speaker. Having worked in the U.K., the Netherlands and Greece, Mr. Kounadis is currently Head of Group Business Compliance at the National Bank of Greece. His presentation highlighted to our audience the varied opportunities a legal education can provide and that one should then make good use of these opportunities to find the career paths of one’s choice.
Our final speaker of the evening was Ms. Rebeca Sanchez (Class of 2014) who after a successful career in Mexico working on M&A and cross border transactions, has now relocated to California. She has recently passed the California State Bar exam and will resume her career based in the Bay area. Her career has been a balance between large international clients and pro-bono cases, something which she would strongly encourage other lawyers to experience should the opportunity be available.
We would like to thank all our speakers, alumni and students for their participation!
