Professor Michael Mainelli, chairman, Z/Yen Group, president, London Chamber of Commerce & Industry, and lord mayor of London 2023-2024, will deliver this year’s keynote at the FundsTech 2026 by Funds Europe conference, taking place in London on 29 April.
Titled “Dear Regulator, My Algorithm Ate The Market: Britain’s AI Regulatory Tightrope Between Brussels, Beijing & The Bay”, it will address how “Artificial intelligence has slipped quietly from the back office to the trading floor, from credit committees to customer service, and from compliance checklists to boardroom strategy”.
This, Mainelli will argue, has turned the UK’s position into a high-wire act: it must now balance between three key models of AI governance:
- Brussels’ instinct to codify and constrain
- Beijing’s drive to command and coordinate
- Silicon Valley’s preference to build first and apologise later.
What does this balancing act mean for UK financial services? Can the UK remain a credible global financial centre while pursuing a pro-innovation regulatory approach that risks leading to “under-regulation until something goes wrong”?
Professor Mainelli is a qualified accountant, securities professional, computer specialist, and management consultant, educated at Harvard, Trinity College Dublin, and LSE, where he was also visiting professor.
Originally a research scientist in aerospace (rocket science) and computing (architecture & cartography), he became a senior partner of accountants BDO Binder Hamlyn and a director of UK Ministry of Defence research.
During a mergers & acquisitions spell in merchant banking with Deutsche Morgan Grenfell, he co-founded Z/Yen, the City of London think-tank, promoting societal advance through better finance and technology. Z/Yen is renowned for its Global Financial, Green Finance, and Smart Centres indices where he leads technology and economic research.
He is senior independent director of the United Kingdom Accreditation Service and non-executive director of a listed mining firm, emeritus professor & life fellow at Gresham College, fellow of King’s College London, Birkbeck, Guildhall School of Music & Drama, Goodenough College, a bencher at Middle Temple, visiting professor at UCL’s Bartlett School and City St George University.
His book The Price Of Fish: A New Approach To Wicked Economics & Better Decisions, won the Independent Publisher Book Awards Finance, Investment & Economics Gold Prize. He is active in seventeen livery companies, an alderman of the City of London, was lord mayor 2023-2024, sheriff 2019-2021, with charity interests in the environment, education, and care.
FundsTech 2026 by Funds Europe
This year’s event features insights into key technology developments affecting the asset management industry, including:
- The new regulatory frontier of AI, cloud and digital assets
- How to choose between private vs public blockchain
- The growing need for cybersecurity
- Case studies on modernising the investor experience, and into implementing LTAF/ELTIF 2.0
- Understanding the quantum computing frontier and its impact on financial services
- A vision of what an asset manager will be in 2030
- How to build the workforce of the future
Attendance at this year’s event is free for qualifying delegates.
For more information on the event and the agenda, click here.
