LME Mumbai Forum 2024: speakers

Tony started his career with Chilean copper producer Codelco followed by trading roles in physical trade houses Engelhard, Koch Industries & Mitsubishi.
Tony joined the physical trading team at StoneX in 2009 and moved across to the LME team in 2011 when StoneX became a category 1, ring-dealing member of the exchange.

Yang  Liu  is the Head of China Sales at the London Metal Exchange, responsible for developing LME’s footprint in China and emerging markets.

Ms Yang has over 20 years of experience from brokerage and investment banks in the commodity sector, with a focus on industrial background clients in the Asia Pacific region.

Ms Yang has well-rounded knowledge and expertise to help her clients maximise potential in financing, hedging and trading. Prior to joining the LME in 2016, Ms Yang worked as Director of Standard Chartered Bank and Senior Account executive for Category 1 LME member such as Natixis and Sucden Financials.

Ms Yang has Master’s degree in Management and Finance from the University of Bath. 

David Low currently oversees the Derivatives Clearing and Execution business for DBS Bank Ltd.
David, a qualified Chartered Accountant was the Senior Vice President – Head of Finance and Treasury for Refco Singapore from 2001 to 2005. He joined DBS Group in 2006 to spearhead initiatives in commodities and clearing.

The Derivatives Clearing and Execution department at DBS Group has garnered many awards in Singapore and Asia and is the leading clearing broker of commodity products in Asia.

David manages a team of about 16 professionals covering global derivatives markets for Institution, Corporate and Wealth customers. As the Head of Derivatives Clearing and Execution, David has further oversight over the development of the commodities derivatives business in various DBS Group regional offices.

David currently sits on the Regional Advisory Board of Futures Industry Association of Asia and is also a member for SGX Rubber Committee. He was also a past Executive Committee member for the Futures Industry Association of Asia. DBS Group has subsidiaries or memberships in Singapore, Hong Kong, China, India, Indonesia, Taiwan and London as well as regional representative and associated offices in USA, Malaysia, Vietnam, Thailand, Philippines, South Korea, Japan, UAE and Australia.

Kevin started his career with Barclays Bank in 1986, joining their fast track development programme.

After undertaking various roles, covering corporate banking, internal audit and operations, he was selected to join the banks investment banking division, Barclays Capital, in 1993. He joined the Risk team within the commodities division, primarily focused on metals. 

Over the next, circa 25 years, Kevin remained in risk management, largely within the commodities arena, albeit with some level of exposure to other asset classes. This culminated in his role as Chief Risk Officer, for Marex Financial Limited (‘Marex’), where he was also an Executive Committee member and Board Director.

He held this role between 2005 and 2015. In 2015, Kevin was offered a new role within Marex, as Chief Operating Officer and Head of Product Development, for the metals division, his first move into a commercial position. 

In 2019, Kevin was presented with an opportunity to join the LME, initially within the Business and Service Development team. During this time, he led, and was involved in, a number of key projects and was a major contributor to the LME’s Strategic Pathway initiative. 

In 2020, Kevin was asked to head up the LME sales team, the role which he holds today. He has brought greater structure and direction to this team, leveraging his many years of senior managerial experience and industry knowledge.

Kevin is an experienced LME professional with almost 30 years service at exchanges, investment banks, physical trading firms and broker/dealers. Kevin is an Associate of the Chartered Institute of Bankers. 

Dr Ila Patnaik is the Group Chief Economist at the Aditya Birla Group. Prior to this she was a professor at the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy (NIPFP) for 16 years. 

She was the Principal Economic Advisor to the Government of India where she conceptualized the Economic Survey of India 2013-2014.  She has been an associate for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and a visiting scholar to IMF, Washington. She has served on several Government advisory committees and working groups on financial policy and regulation.

Unni is Head of Price Risk Management for Hindalco, Aditya Birla Group

In his earlier role, he was the Business Controller for Hindalco. 

He is a finance leader with over 23 years of experience in various industries such as metals, pharmaceuticals and retail.

Unni is a Chartered Accountant and has worked in various areas of finance such as risk management, controllership and business finance. 

Kunal Shah is Head of Commodity Research at Nirmal Bang securities Pvt. Ltd. He has over 20 years of experience in the Indian and International commodity markets and closely tracks precious metals, base metals, energy and agricultural commodities with his team. 

At Nirmal Bang, Kunal is responsible for guiding the commodity research vertical and manages a team of professionals who not only cater to retail clients, but also to corporates seeking hedging solutions, to Mutual funds, Alternative investment funds and Mining Companies. He is responsible for managing corporate and institutions desk at Nirmal Bang along with research desk. He is part of advisory committee of major commodity exchanges in India. He has won the award of the zee business best analyst award in 2011. 

His views are sought by the print media, television media and wire services on a regular basis for his views and comments on the commodities markets. He has been keynote speaker and panelist on various domestic commodity conferences and international conferences. Mr. Shah has been speaker and panelists on international conferences such as Asia Money conference, Mines and Money London, Hong Kong, Singapore, Imarc conference at Melbourne where he was invited by Victorian government to give presentation on how Australian miners can benefit out of India’s boom

Viral Shah is the Managing Editor for the Low Carbon and Base Metals team in EMEA at S&P Global Commodity Insights, with a special interest in recycled commodities from ferrous scrap to the nascent black mass market. He has eight years of experience covering a variety of ferrous and non-ferrous markets.

Viral Shah, Head of Brokerage at 360 ONE Wealth is a financial markets veteran with more than 20 years of experience in brokering, risk management, product development, onshore and offshore commodities hedging as well as wealth management.

Starting his career with Refco in 2002, he has successfully managed businesses at the top brokerage houses in India.

In his current role, he has been able to create a niche by positioning commodities as an alternative asset class in the wealth management set up.

Under his leadership, IIFL Wealth (360 ONE Wealth) started the metals delivery business in 2019 and scaled it up to become the largest metals futures broker in India, bagging the award for the “Leading broker in physical delivery business” for FY20, FY21 and FY22 by MCX.

He is an active participant and an invited member in many regulatory, industry associations and exchange product advisories for developing the commodities ecosystem in India. 

Joe started his career at Macquarie Bank in Sydney and was transferred to HK in 2006 following Macquarie’s acquisition of ING Barings Asian Equities franchise.

Shortly after the Global Financial Crisis, Joe joined Liquid Capital, a proprietary trading and market making firm specialising in index options overseeing a team managing technology and business operations.

Joe then joined the HK Mercantile Exchange looking client relationships until an opportunity came up to join the Asian leadership team of First Derivatives (Kx) looking after strategy, business development and sales, based in HK.

In 2016 Joe took up a post at the LME in Singapore, covering clients in APAC, Middle East and India. 

Joe has over 20 years in the financial industry across sell side, buy side, exchanges and vendor organisations.