Business Bermuda holds successful Annual Financial Services Conference in New York

05 October 2011

New York, NY, October 5, 2011 – Business Bermuda is holding a very successful and well-attended Annual New York Financial Services Conference on Wednesday, October 5, 2011 at the Harvard Club of New York. More than 300 leading business executives from the financial services industry including insurance / reinsurance executives, asset managers, lawyers, accountants and other service providers have attended panel discussions and speeches throughout the day.  

The conference featured a keynote speech during lunch by The Honorable Paula Cox, JP, MP, Premier and Minister of Finance of Bermuda. Premier Cox was introduced by Sir Richard Gozney, the Governor of Bermuda.  The Honorable Patrice Minors, JP, MP, Minister of Business Development and Tourism participated in a panel discussion on hotel development and tourism with Malcolm Butterfield, Chairman of the Bermuda Tourism Board and partner at KPMG and Brian Duperreault, a leading business executive and hotel developer.   Among the highlights this year, the conference started with two concurrent panel sessions at 8:30 AM on insurance and reinsurance and asset management, both under the theme, “Open for Business.”  

The sessions had sizeable crowds of more than 200 people in total and they heard and participated in discussions that focused on new product and service developments as well as the regulatory, legal and financial environment for both insurance / reinsurance and asset management.

Among the participants in the insurance and reinsurance panel sessions were: David Cash, CEO of Endurance and Chairman of Business Bermuda; Susan Patschak, CEO of Canopius and Jonathan Kim, Senior Vice President and General Counsel of Montpelier Re among several others. The asset management panel session had, for the first time, both service providers and fund managers including: Andrew Baron of Butterfield Bank; Sally-Anne Baron of Timber Capital; and Craig Bodenstab of Orbis Funds.  Jeremy Cox, CEO of the Bermuda Monetary Authority and Gregory Wojciechowski, CEO of the Bermuda Stock Exchange were active participants in the panel session on offshore business and Bermuda, which was moderated by Pamela Burrows, Assistant Financial Secretary of Bermuda’s Ministry of Finance.  The session included the release of a study on the economic relationship between Bermuda and the United States that was conducted by Dr. Charles Ludolph, a senior economist and the former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Commerce for the United States. Ms. Cheryl Packwood, CEO of Business Bermuda, also participated on the panel.

Commenting on the conference, Ms. Cheryl Packwood, CEO of Business Bermuda said: “This was a great day for Bermuda and we made tremendous progress in delivering the message that Bermuda is ‘open for business.’ We are pleased to have so much support from the government, regulators and from our business community, but also excited about the interest from the New York financial services community.

We are confident that there are meaningful business opportunities that have resulted from this event.” The conference includes additional panel sessions following lunch that are being held throughout the afternoon on a range of topics including: trusts, the convergence of hedge funds and reinsurance, private wealth, infrastructure, aircraft and shipping registry, hotel development and tourism, the capital markets and the legal and licensing requirements for doing business in Bermuda. Follow-up information, including copies of the presentation and video footage of the sessions will be available at www.businessbermuda.org <http://www.businessbermuda.org>  in the coming days.

About Business Bermuda Business Bermuda is a business organization of Bermuda resident service providers that provide quality banking, legal, accounting, re/insurance, financial, trust, management and e-commerce services and products to the international client. The organization works with the private sector and Government to develop and promote the island as one of the world’s foremost centers for international business. 
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