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The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) has announced the appointment of Maha El Dimachki as the new head of the BIS Innovation Hub Singapore Centre, effective from 1 October 2023.
El Dimachki, an Australian national, brings a wealth of experience from both the public and private sectors, having previously served in senior roles at the UK's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and commercial banks.
Her appointment comes at a time when the BIS Innovation Hub Singapore Centre, established in 2019, is actively engaged in several innovative projects that focus on areas such as supervisory technology (suptech), regulatory technology (regtech), Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs), and next-generation Financial Market Infrastructures (FMIs).
Rich background in financial innovation
El Dimachki is currently the head of early and high growth oversight at the FCA, where she leads a team responsible for providing supervisory support for start-up firms. She has also served as the FCA's payments department head and chief payments officer of Pay.UK, the country's operator of retail interbank payment systems. She previously held various roles at RBS, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, and National Australia Bank, according to her LinkedIn profile.
"She brings a rich set of experiences from both public and private sector and she understands the importance of rules while allowing for innovations," Cecilia Skingsley, head of the BIS Innovation Hub, said in an announcement.
Hub of innovation
The BIS Innovation Hub develops public goods in the technology space to support central banks and improve the functioning of the financial system. It's Singapore Centre, launched in 2019, collaborates with a network of co-innovators and partners, contributing to the incubation and rollout of new and innovative technologies.
The Singapore Centre's projects include Project Mariana, which explores automated market-makers for the cross-border exchange of hypothetical CBDCs; Project Nexus, a blueprint for connecting domestic payment systems to enable instant cross-border payments; Project Viridis, a platform to help financial authorities understand the impact of climate-related risks; and Project Ellipse, which explores how supervision could become insights-based and data-driven using an integrated regulatory data and analytics platform.
