Game Changers issue 30

Game Changers ISSUE #30

ARISE ARISTION! GC speaks exclusively to the brains behind Aristion Consulting.

GAME CHANGERS

DIRECTORY O1

Note from the editor

O2

Constantinos Aristophanous

O3 O4 O5 O6 O7 O8 O9 1O 11 12 13 14 15 16 17

View from the top. 03

Aristion Consulting. 04-07

Stefan Nilson Hedge Funds Club. 08-11

Andrew Anastasiou Legion Pay. 12-13

How to make a million Dollars from Joe Biden! 14-15 Chris Donnelly Verb Brands. 16-18

Andrea Papageorgiou EverFX. 20-21

Speakers Corner Anonymous. 22-25

Ludovic Vuillier Baer’s Crest. 26-27

PRIME TIME BREAKS RECORD GCTV PRIME TIME. 28-29

GC: LUXURY 31-33

GC: DRIVE 34-35

GC: FEMME 36-39

GC: HOMME 40-42

GC: EAT & DRINK DIONYSUS MANSION. 43-45

GC: FITNESS 46-49

GC:SPORTS 50-51

VIEW FROM THE TOP

Hello everyone, Well we made it to the end of the year, and it is a great relief to get to the finish line of 2020. Needless to say it has been an incredibly challenging year, so it is a great relief to get to the end and do a mental reset for 2021.

We have a number of new faces in GC030 with the team from Aristion Consulting gracing the cover.

Thanks to Constantinos Aristophanous, Pavlina Kanella and George Hadjinicodemou for a wonderful image to grace the front page.

In case you have not seen, Constantinos and myself recently shot a couple of editions of Prime Time which you can find on both our Linkedin page and our YouTube channel.

Thanks everyone for your continued support for GC, we have made huge progress this year, and look to keep pushing on further in the next year.

Happy Christmas!

Paul ORFORD EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Game Changers

Aristion Consulting CONSTANTINOS ARISTPHANOUS Founder of Aristion Consulting

Aristion can offer a brand that Dealing department vision, as an outsourced service at a fraction of the cost of having 4 or 5 multi year experienced dealers, without all the additional costs that this incurs for your brokerage. Overall, this can save the firms, tens of thousands a year, and with budgets so tight, the money saved could perhaps be better placed in the marketing/sales budget for more exposure of the company to the public.

Constantinos Aristophanous Founder of Aristion Consulting

GC met Constantinos Aristophanous for a coffee on a deceptively hot day at Limassol pier, to find out more about what Aristion Consulting is, and how it can help you. Constantinos has been a firm fixture in the Cyprus FX scene for a long time, so it was great to finally get him in GC.

Q Let’s start with the tried and tested way for any interview.Who are you and why did you start Aristion Consulting?

We Founded Aristion a couple of years back,we are a team of professionals who have been in the industry in key positions for a number of years in Investment firms, where we gained a huge amount of experience understanding the nuts and bolts of running a successful brokerage business.

What we mostly understood from our journey is that brokerage firms need a strong brokerage/dealing department to healthily grow and progress and conquer the markets. Due to the high pace and huge pressure for numbers, management of CIFs most of the time focus on other departments and forget that the dealing department is the heart of the company.

If that department runs flawless, the whole company runs flawless and can perform. Afterall, the dealing department is the department executing the vision of management. The more efficient the department, the more efficiently the rest of the departments will work.

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

A massive upside of our service is that the firms will not face any issues with the high employee turnover.

This is a continuous headache for all Brokers as due to this a lot of plans get postponed, or delayed until new employees catch up with the business activities.

Especially when they lose their head of Dealing. In addition, the firms save themselves from the trouble of having to fill the vacancies with qualified manpower as well. All this responsibility is on us, and we are very organized in assisting in the induction of new employees in our team. Something worth mentioning here is that all our team members are obliged to become Certified Technical Analysts in order to grasp what clients do and fully understand the industry they are working in.

Thus, whether you are a startup or a well established brand, there is a lot of competition for high quality staff members. With our service, you have incredibly experienced staff infrastructure, who will offer their knowledge and experience to give your brand stability and opportunity to focus on increasing brand exposure.

Q You are also offering something that is totally unique to other service providers. You can set up a Real Stocks offering for a brokerage to sell to clients.

How does this work?

This is very straightforward for us to do, and we feel that it really adds value to a brand. As part of our dealing service, this is a great added value to Firms service, as it gives them the credibility of being a real investment company. Moreover, it helps in building a long term relationship with a client.

How many times have we seen brands saying they are looking to build a long term relationship with a client?

Well, this now provides a different way of achieving

this without costing anything to the broker. Traditionally it is just a couple of months historically with a standard retail brokerage, this really is game changing by making that relationship into years!

Real stocks offering gives CIFs the opportunity to onboard clients with no experience as risk categorization and profiling is not so strict and give the opportunity to clients to trade and get all the necessary experience to be able to become real traders and trade on other financial instruments as Forex, Futures and CFDs. Further to this, Firms can get a massive amount of high quality marketing content with new stories to tell from the stock market which come every single day.

To receive this service, we are happy to assist in helping you set up and can show you every step of the way how to do this from the Dealing side, Regulatory side and Reporting side.

George Hadjinikodemou CEO of Aristion Consulting

Q Why have CIFs not taken advantage of this already?

I would suggest that it is a great option for a brokerage looking to make a plan for the next five years, with the understanding that there will be some radical changes coming to the derivative trading industry.

Historically it is down to time and effort. As we know, dealing rooms are hugely stretched for time as it is.

Moreover, if they were to do it themselves it is very hard to find the relationships to carry it out in an efficient manner.

Furthermore, Brokers will look far more credible institutions if they offer products such as this, which can only add value to the brand over the next several years. It shows that they are here to stay by offering a full range of products to their clients.

The CIF has to consider execution, regulatory and reporting obligations and everything must be fully taken care of before the launch of this offering. What we do pride ourselves on is having those existing quality relationships, which can save the broker of this trouble and money by using our service.

Where marketing costs are becoming increasingly more expensive for client acquisition, a wider audience can be attracted who are looking to invest, rather than the traditional client looking to learn to trade.

Breaking away from the standard retail brokerage client model which can be quite constraining, to have the message heard from a wider audience.

It does need a very progessive mindset from the owners of the brand, as this product might not be so profitable as such, however it really is great to diversify the way the firm penetrates the market and attract clients.

More importantly, in case the firm is using MT5, we can provide a single file with all the offering to be immediately uploaded on the Broker’s server saving the hustle and cost for testing plus the connection is done outside any bridge saving additional costs to the brokers.

Based on previous client integrations, this takes around one week to complete after the liquidity agreement is in place.

In addition, we provide all valuable information for corporate actions, dividends and stock splits. If you are looking to do this on your own. There is a lot of work behind this service, so you may need to employ extra people just to cover it. Imagine offering Stocks from forty different exchanges. The dealing room has to monitor all of them which is a lot of work.

Q What type of brokerage would be looking to take this service on?

Q Can a brokerage diversify further if they wish to with your services?

We did have a client recently who came from the retail side who are looking to structure their own portfolios. The brokerage client was looking for us to create Thematic baskets of stocks but showing it as a single tradeable symbol for clients. For example, you could ask for your portfolio to be made up of 50% Tesla,30% Amazon and 20% Facebook.

What diversified our product is: 1. the fact that all corporate actions (dividends/splits) are translated and reflected in the Index price by having an index divisor running in the back.

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Although firms may be experiencing a mild form of resistance from their clients regarding switching to MT5, it is well worth taking the step.

It can offer so much more, and will help the company plan the next five years based on this platform. Moreover, anything that a brokerage firm has or requires, we can deliver if they have this platform.

Q Local brokerages with an STP license, surely it is a great tool for them?

Pavlina Kanella COO of Aristion Consulting

2. Brokers can choose a rebalancing policy on the weights if initial weights do not apply after price changes on the components.

3. Brokers can choose initial Index date and initial index price and price chart is created based on this offering clients the ability to check history.

4. Dealing room has live updates on the Index components exposures and hedge directly to LPs. Q With MetaQuotes offering a huge amount of encouragement to take up MT5, does this help in offering these services?

The back end of MT5 is far superior compared to MT4, where we can do so much more for the brokerage.

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

Yes it is, as historically the license was used for credibility and to help the brand with their banking situation. By offering shares, you are maximising the license and offer the client something new, increasing the all important longevity of them.

I would suggest that this is great for start up brokerages, we can offer the ability to connect to liquidity providers that we work with, under an all in one offering reducing the costs and effort for them. STP licensed brokers face the problem of combining LPs with different offerings and different symbol specifications like contract sizes, minimum trade sizes and margins requirements. With our help, the headaches of finding and matching multiple LP’s will be gone.

Q What’s the best way of contacting you?

You can reach out to us the usual ways, such as the website which is Aristionconsultin.com, and you can email us on info@aristionconsulting.com

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Hedge Funds Club STEFAN NILSSON Founder of Hedge Funds Club

Stefan Nilsson has long been synonymous with some of the highest quality networking events in Asia.

Moreover, his website the Hedge Funds Club which has been at the vanguard of this niche for over 15 years, is often the go to venue for hedge fund information. GC was honoured to speak with Stefan about HFC, also to pick his brains about rock music...enjoy!

Q You’re an incredibly well travelled person. How did you end up going from Sweden to Japan?

Stefan Nilson Founder of Hedge Funds Club

I grew up in Sweden and travelled quite a bit already as a child. At 18 I went to the US for studies and at 20 I relocated to London. Soon after arriving in London, I met my Japanese wife in college. We stayed in London for ten years, started our careers and got our MBAs. That was when I got involved in the hedge fund industry. My wife went into investment banking and in 2004 she was offered a transfer to her native Japan. We went for it and Tokyo has been our home ever since. Tokyo is the best city on this planet and it is a great travel hub with good connections to the world. There are also terrific domestic travel destinations which I enjoy visiting. Japan is geographically a very diverse set of islands, from the beaches and subtropical climate of Okinawa to the ski slopes of Hokkaido. I love it here.

For the more established, bigger funds it is a great way to, for example, find employees and stay in front of investors. For investors, the Hedge Funds Club gets them direct access to funds they have never heard of.

Many of the best new funds don’t appear in industry databases until it’s too late. We also partner with world-class service providers as sponsors and between them they have the solutions to most of a fund manager’s needs and wants. Perhaps most important of all, it is a great way to meet people and have some fun away from the trading screens.

Q In case readers are not aware the Hedge Funds Club started way back in 2005. What motivated you to start it?

In the early years, we just hosted networking events.

As these events rapidly grew and evolved, we had to support that with a website with event updates, news, views, interviews and much more. There were, and still are, few publications available in English that are focused on the hedge fund industry in the Asia-Pacific region. We have always enjoyed great industry support. We try to find a balance between entertaining and informing our audience.

Very simple: Necessity. When I moved to Tokyo from London in 2004, I led a small hedge fund start-up business. I didn’t know anyone. Thus, I decided to throw a party to get investors and fund managers together and start building my network. It worked. It still works. The reason it does is that the Hedge Funds Club is useful for everybody, not just me. Initially we did by-invitation-only networking events for hedge funds and investors in Tokyo but after a few years we expanded into Singapore and Hong Kong and most recently Australia. Over the years it has grown into a great regional network that is useful to all its active participants. We provide the knowledge and connections needed to launch and survive as a hedge fund.

We are a natural meeting place for the movers and shakers of the industry as well as the new kids on the block. For newer, smaller funds it’s a great way to meet investors and other players who can assist them.

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

Q It’s fair to say that the internet was not the predominant way to receive news back in 2005. Were you always an online publication?

Q I really like the way that the Stefan Nilsson brand has been developed. How much has this helped you in other aspects of your business?

It’s just me, who I am. That’s the point – be yourself, be authentic and do what you do. Earlier in my career, when I worked for others, I often had to fit into roles.

That wasn’t me. For the past decade I have been able to just be myself and do things I want to do. In recent years, the TV show “Billions” has made the fictitious hedge fund manager Bobby Axelrod’s love for heavy metal a continuous part of the story line. They

even had a guest appearance by Metallica in one episode. I have lived that “hedge funds and heavy metal” connection for more than two decades. It’s just who I am. It’s not an act, it’s not a created image.

Being myself has certainly helped me do better business and opened new and sometimes unexpected doors. People do business with people. Either they like me or they don’t.

Q One thing I have really admired about the HFC events is that they seem very elegant, and I am not blinded by sponsors everywhere.

Why did you choose to do it this way?

We are fortunate to work with some great and very loyal sponsors, some who have been with us for many years. But our flagship events are focused on networking – they are not conferences and thus they do not have vendor presentations. We tend to host our events at classy private members clubs and similar to ensure great service and a good atmosphere.

We have also done some one-off events in special locations, including the Canadian and Swedish embassies in Tokyo.

Q What makes a good event?

There are many components to it, but the key ingredient is having the right people there. If you have the right people, then you can turn to details such as atmosphere, service, catering, entertainment, location, convenience, etc. But it really is about the people. As the

host, I make a point of personally greeting people as they arrive and can thus help my distinguished guests with whatever they need.

Q Although you have had online panels with HFC, does this come close to seeing people at a venue?

Webinars and other online initiatives are very different from our face-to-face meetings. They are useful and a good way for members to stay connected, engaged and informed when we haven’t been able to meet in person. But proper networking needs to be done in person. The webinars are good for sharing information and having discussions, but less so for networking.

Q In your capital raising workshops, how does this work? Are

you teaching attendees presentation skills, or is there practical advice on how to raise funds?

I have taught capital raising, marketing and investor relations at several business schools, including Henley Business School and University of Hong Kong. I also offer these for specific firms or organisations and sometimes tailor things to fit specific needs.

Generally speaking, I cover a lot of ground in such workshops and try to make them as interactive as possible, not least by using examples from people in the room. A lot of it is practical and actionable rather than academic.

Q I personally have found that the world of ‘business social media’ can be quite stuffy when you mention personal stuff, like

your love of rock music. Do you get any backlash from this?

No, I don’t. Quite the opposite. I am a firm believer in making business personal. People do business with people. I am who I am. People who don’t like my approach, don’t need to do business with me. Those who choose to do, they know what they’re getting.

Q In case the readers are not aware, you also edit Roppongi Rocks, which is one of Japan’s leading international rock magazines. Where do you find the time?

It’s about prioritising one’s time. We all have just 24 hours in a day, but we can decide how we use that time. Earlier in my career I worked for bigger organisations, including two American investment banks, where a lot of time typically is wasted in endless meetings and one gets buried in bureaucracy. For the past decade I have been independent and thus can avoid a lot of those time-wasting exercises. I just work with things and people I really enjoy. If I don’t like something, I don’t have to do it. I choose what I want to spend my time on. Family and rock music come high up on my priority list and so does the Hedge Funds Club.

Q Was it harder to make connections in the world of rock for content for Roppongi Rocks compared to HFC? Not really. I have always been an outsider and what I am good at is taking a seat at the table. If there is no seat available, I bring my own chair. Or I build a new

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

table. Launching the Hedge Funds Club and Roppongi Rocks were both about creating something from scratch as a way to do what I wanted to do. It’s about attitude and not being afraid of challenging the status quo. In my early days in Japan I was constantly told that I couldn’t and shouldn’t do certain things. I soon realised that my biggest asset was being different, not trying to fit in. By ignoring all the “that can’t be done” and “we don’t do it like that here”, I found a way to build a career on my own terms. Being different is a winning formula.

Q Which industry has the biggest divas. Music or finance?

There are plenty of divas in both. But the best performers in the long-term in both industries are those that are extraordinarily talented, hardworking, innovative and humble. Divas fail sooner or later.

Q In your humble opinion, who has had a bigger impact on the world. Kiss or Tesla (the car, not person)?

That’s hard to compare. Impact is tricky to quantify.

I personally don’t have any opinion on Tesla specifically. But I note that a high stock valuation is not necessarily an indication of anything apart from people speculating on price movements. Tesla recently hitting a US$500bn valuation and being included in the blue-chip S&P 500 stock index are signs of potential trouble on the horizon. But in the meantime, plenty of hedge funds and others are happily trading the stock, long and short. Kiss has sold more than 75 million albums worldwide, holds the title as the USA’s number one gold record award-winning group of all time and,

pre-pandemic, had a very busy and successful touring business and a massive merchandising business.

Their live show is terrific. Kiss has certainly made a bigger impact on my life.

Q If I were to offer you a choice between a night out with Kiss (peak stadium rock era), or a seat at the top table with Warren Buffett. Which one would you choose?

I have met the members of Kiss on many occasions.

They are always a joy to meet and talk to. They are great business people and marketing wizards, always a step ahead of many of the other rock bands when it comes to business. There are many lessons one can learn from their business successes and failures.

Warren Buffett has obviously been a very successful investor over many years. As he has now turned 90, I hope he gets some time off to chill rather than sitting at top tables talking shop.

Q As someone who loves stadium rock, do you think the sounds from the 70’s and 80’s can be beaten in the modern era?

Yes. Many fans are stuck in the past. Of course, plenty of classic rock was created in the past decades, but

there are many, many terrific new artists out there right now. It is harder for them to reach through the noise and make it to the stadium level. But give them a chance. Sweaty club gigs can often be better than stadium or arena shows.

Q In 2021 where would you like to see HFC evolve to, and what will happen to rock music with limited live events?

Who knows? On New Year’s Eve a year ago, I sat with my family on a yacht in Victoria Harbour in Hong Kong convinced that 2020 was going to be a busy year with events, projects and travel across the Asia-Pacific region. That outlook quickly changed and I had to make adjustments to my life and work. For HFC, I’d like to continue beefing up our content and online efforts while hopefully also being able to host in-person events again. On the rock music front, I am hoping that we will see gigs and tours again. My mind and soul need it. I have some great expansion plans for Roppongi Rocks that were put on hold this year and I am hopeful we can start implementing them in 2021.

To find out more about the Hedge Funds Club, please visit: www.hedgefundsclub.com

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Legion Pay ANDREW ANASTASIOU Fintech Entrepreneur

Why are Cashiers and multi-PSP Gateways becoming so popular?

Until relatively recent times, it was the norm for high-risk businesses to scour the internet and expo’s searching for that next-big-thing in the payments industry and find that new PSP that can acquire funds for them in the most obscure of jurisdictions at the lowest possible prices.

However, after simultaneous attacks on the high-risk sector from large EU regulators and even financial service companies across the globe, businesses operating in the non-EU Forex area, as well as their friends in the online gambling and casino arena, have gradually found it harder and more time consuming to find the best payment services for their company.

This is where the original payment consultants and banking solution seekers came in. With their multitude of affiliate agreements and introducer contracts neatly packed away in their desk, these titans of the industry were able to send a quick email and have you on the journey to on-boarding with the PSP of your dreams, and you didn’t even have to open Google!

However, there was one major flaw with this solution, and that was the tech integration side.

With the benefit of being introduced and accepted by multiple payment service providers, came the laborious task of having to integrate your CRM and back-office with each gateway, as well as having to manage the customer transactions, request refunds and withdrawals all from different places. One obvious solution for this was to build a system where the Merchant could manage all of their transactions and providers in one place.

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

Welcome, to the cashier system! As with LegionPay, our newest project where we are integrating (as of today) 160+ payment solutions accompanied with an awesome and user-friendly back office, a really cool team, and 24/7 support – payment cashier systems are currently one of the best ways to get started with a high-risk business or consolidate your PSPs into one safe and easy-to-access place. In line with the efficiency of the whole solution, is the ability to also get lower processing rates, as with LegionPay we make sure that our providers take into consideration our overall volume coming through our gateway and not just your volumes. By doing this, it means that we can usually get discounts of over 1% on the normal MDR for our merchants, potentially saving thousands!

In any case, if you are using a cashier system (not just Legion Pay’s), then you are certainly making a good decision for your business. Why would anyone want to work harder and not smarter? And why would anyone not want to benefit from the relationship and knowledge of others? The cashier systems and the oneintegration-one hundred-solution structure is, in my opinion, an amazing solution and encompasses the strengths of payment consultants with the efficiency of tech, making the lives and operations of high-risk operators much easier and ultimately, more successful.

One thing is for sure in our industry though, and that is that the future is always evolving and very exciting.

New solutions and innovations pop up all the time and keeping up with them is no small feat. And with such an unbelievable crazy year we have had in 202, here’s to the end of a crazy year, and to a better and more successful 2021!

Andrew Anastasiou Fintech Entrepreneur

How to make a million Dollars from Joe Biden!

Let me get it straight from the outset, PEOPLE SHOULD NOT FOLLOW MY ADVICE FOR INVESTING, a good night out sure I can give you plenty of tips. But sadly, when it comes to trading, I have never opened a live trade in my life, and knowing from an operational perspective how the game works probably never will.

So with my caveat out of the way, here’s the aim of what I am looking to do. Can someone with zero investment knowledge beat the experts? I had two choices when I decided to take on this challenge.

Either throw darts at a list of stocks, or use my University education for the first time in a professional manner, namely the study of Politics to try and beat the markets.

This may seem as a mad way to choose an investment strategy, however based upon meeting many investment ‘professionals’, whose suggestions appeared to be fueled by hot air and cocaine....perhaps my suggestion is not as crazy as I first thought.

GC consulted various ‘investing’ websites giving me the basic advice of the do’s and don’ts in investing.

Being the curious person that I am, I also took up the invite to sign up for investment suggestions and newsletters from these sites. ranging from the mildly sensible to the utterly latest incredulous crypto based AI related investment vehicles.

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

After careful analysis, setting fire to my bag of money would probably show me a higher rate of return, rather than the regular calls outlining the new opportunities that they could connect me with, Feeling positive after the website suggestions, I felt confident in making some kind of strategy based upon what I believe to know, and confident that I would not be on the streets within the next several months.

Methodology.

WIth the incoming new President of the United States and using my cutting edge psephological skills learnt from my studies many years ago, can I beat the markets?

I will be picking stocks and weighting them in a portfolio based upon political appointees, transitional team and donors to Joe Biden’s campaign for the US Presidential run in 2020.

The stocks.

Google (GOOGL) Facebook (FB) Former CEO of Google Eric Schmidt and former co-founder of Facebook Dustin Moskovitz made considerable donations to Biden related Super PACs.

Amazon (AMZN). Because they own everything!

Fox Corporation (FOXA). Expect staggering ad revenues, as they should mirror MSNBC and CNN editorial line of being adversarial to the incumbent. Based upon election data 70m Trump supporters will need to find a news station that supports their confirmation bias.

Raytheon Technologies Corporation ( RTX). Many insiders are arguing that this will be the third term of Obamaism. Based upon the previous two terms, expect many places to have democracy delivered via a combination of highly explosive materials.

Moreover, under Obama they actually run out of peace bombs, after giving too much democracy from 10,000 feet...this spells explosive returns for my portfolio!

Lockheed Martin Corporation (LMT). See Raytheon above.

Discover Financial Services (DFS).

With Biden being the Senator for Delaware, and a well known spokesman for the Credit Card industry, it would be a fair assumption to expect helpful legislation and assistance.

JP Morgan (JPM) Bank Of America (BAC) Goldman Sachs (GS) During the Primaries when garnering support from Wall Street, Biden was claimed to have calmed Ameri-

ca’s financial institutions nerves by claiming that nothing will fundamentally change in the financial system.

CoreCivic. CXW. Both Biden and Vice President Harris are very strong advocates on the law and order ticket. Moreover, with Biden being the architect of the controversial 1994 Crime Bill, where common consensus argues that this began the prison industrial complex. Lets hope this choice does not lock down my profits!

So there’s the ‘Biden Basket’ of stocks which may or may not make me millions. For the record we picked the stocks on the election day, so we will keep you informed on how they fared.

Did you study something that has no relevance or use to your professional life, and think you can beat the market based on this knowledge? Let us know we would love to hear your experiences. ****IMPORTANY NOTICE: DO NOT TAKE WHAT I SAID AS INVESTMENT ADVICE OR AS A WAY TO MAKE SURE FIRE MONEY. I AM GOING TO SAY IT AGAIN. IF YOU FOLLOW MY LOGIC AS INVESTMENT ADVICE, I WOULD SEEK THE ADVICE OF A PSYCHIATRIC PROFESSIONAL. MANY THANKS, PO****

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Verb Brands CHRIS DONNELLY Founder & CEO of Verb Brands

Q Why did you choose luxury brands as Verbs niche market?

Q Are you selective over which brands you take on?

There are a few reasons really. I’ve grown up loving the brands and in particular the aesthetic of luxury brands. So when I started my journey to support brands on their digital strategies, it was a natural progression to look to the brands I had always admired.

Very selective - we will work with luxury and premium brands that span all sectors and recently have been working with a lot of newer D2C brands that have brought new products to the market which is a fun space to work in.

Then once I had started looking at these brands, I noticed the luxury sector was generally very poorly served when it came to how they represented themselves digitally and how they acquired their customers. I knew I could help them develop here. The progression of this work has not only been to support the sector’s transition to adopting digital but to help brands stay relevant. It’s a fun challenge.

Q Do you also charge luxury brand levels of costs for your service?

I would say that our rates are competitive to the typical digital marketing landscape but certain projects may cost more when we are doing heavy data analysis and building a brands targeting bespoke across paid and programmatic media buys specifically for affluent consumers.

Q What separates Verb from others in your area of expertise?

Q Can you ever make a financial company into a luxury brand?

We are a full-service agency which means we can run a campaign end to end, from the strategy to content, to distribution and measurement.

It goes back to that question as to how we’re defining luxury. In light of my earlier answer; absolutely. It’s about level of service. There are brands that serve the high net worth and their service is similar to a 5* hotel and generally just provide a lot more than a typical financial institution in terms of offering and service.

Our entire team is trained specifically in how to work with luxury and premium brands and how to attract affluent and aspirational customers.

Q What makes a brand luxury? Is there a key criteria to hit?

Quality tends to make a luxury product. We’ve just run a piece of research with Global Web Index which is being launched in Jan which looks at this exact question. Quality is the number one reason people buy luxury. It’s interesting to see what else follows…

There are so many definitions today but I believe that if you are producing a product that has the highest quality within that sector you would consider it a luxury good or service.

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Q How do you select an influencer to match a particular brand?

Influencer selection depends on a number of factors: what the aim of the collaboration is; who their audience is, their personal brand values; their messaging; the loko of their content; other brands they work with, their affinity to the brand we’re looking to paid them with… the list goes. Influence selection is key to success.

Chris Donnelly Founder & CEO of Verb Brands

Q Verb now has a staff of over 60 people. What tips on management and motivation of people do you have?

If you allow people to own work and they will be accountable for their deliverables. Typically, people perform well working this way. I always have believed in giving a lot of autonomy to team members.

Q What does Verb have planned for 2021?

We plan on growing. We want to continue to work with leading premium brands and providing our clients with a first-class service.

Q What’s the best way for a brand to contact you for a consultation? hello@verbbrands.com

EverFX ANDREA PAPAGEORGIOU Head of Legal and Compliance

and I was pretty sure that I was about to get into very challenging paths and this is what kept me driven and motivated along the way of my studies. I was really “hungry” to get out there and start working on my dreams..to become a strong and fearless professional.

I wanted to make history and built on my dream to become someone of value who would be able to help people defend their rights and “fight” for justice.

From a very young age, I was always fighting against injustice and even in games I was involved, I wanted to be fair towards myself and others equally.

In reality, the path I followed was even more challenging that I was expecting with millions of disappointments but that’s ok. I tried to hug all the good and bad staff. At the end of the day, through the rollercoaster of life, we learn things, we grow and eventually become better every single day, if there is always enough will, patience and nerve.

Q Why did you choose the law?

Law has always been my only choice since high school years. I always wanted to pursue my career in Law because I believe that Law is the fundamental of Life & liberty. A career in Law is intellectually challenging, financially rewarding and personally fulfilling. In my sight Law is not just a profession. In my sight it is a medium through which I can serve my nation & people. I did not consider Law only just about rules and regulation. I always believed that Law is also about rights, justice and understanding of human behavior and society.

I chose Law because it helps me in improving my standard of thoughts, skills and knowledge. And it also provides me the courage and support on which I can stand for the rights of others’ and my own.

In your first day of law school, how did you visualise a career in law.

Q Was it like Hollywood, and how close to your image was it to reality?

Hahaha, I was considering my career in law as something great and legendary. I didn’t believe that it would be like Hollywood because I was never a friend of those American-ideals always perfect scenarios.

I love life in its raw version, with its ups and downs

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

Q What advice would you give to a young Andrea, what you know about the legal industry?

I would just say “Don’t let disappointments get you down and never allow anyone to dim your light, even if it’s too shiny for their eyes. You will inspire some but you will annoy others and that is absolutely ok..do your thing and trust your gut, even if you need to walk alone towards achieving your goals.”

Q Managing a team. How do you manage all the different personalities in your team?

How do I manage all the different personalities in my team? My answer would be different. Each one has his own character and this is absolutely fine, while this is what makes us a team. I used to be in their position once and I try not to forget from where I started. I do respect their effort, whether it’s small or not. Effort is always respected, appreciated and recognised. I do pay attention to the result, but effort is the most important for me. I am a strong believer of the ‘team spirit’. If we do not have this, we have nothing. We do support each other and we learn from each other.

Leading by example is the golden rule, for me.

Q How do you stay on top of all the dictats from the regulator?

I wouldn’t call them “dictats from the regulator”, but simple guidance behind which there is always a reasoning. By firstly understanding the reasoning

behind, I believe you can then find a way to implement whatever the rule is, considering the size, nature and complexity of the business, the risk appetite of the Company and of course the operational needs of the Company. Being flexible and open minded in these cases is a key.

Q Sales people think compliance staff are inflexible automatons. Fight your corner for your fellow compliance colleagues. Why do compliance staff have this reputation?

I haven’t met all Compliance Managers so I can be in a position to know how their work affects sales people’s opinion. But, I can assume that the core problem is that many Compliance Managers have become so mired in formalism that they’ve lost their sense of wonder and reduced something dynamic and complex to a static list of observations written for primaryschoolers. In my opinion, the solution is for Compliance Managers to first (re)frame “compliance” not as a series of burdens and impositions, but as an enabler of a better business. We need to educate our colleagues that compliance is not about restrictions and limitations but about optimisation. In practical terms, this means we should focus less on what can’t be done and focus better on how things can, and should, be done. By focusing on optimising the performance and sustainability of the businesses we advise, we’ll shift perceptions as surely as we increase profitability.

Incidentally, this reframing and redefinition process should also help us to confirm “Compliance” as a strategic management discipline (and one that grapples with fundamental issues – motivation, incentives, behaviour, intent, acts and consequences). Bottom line is that we should always try to be professionals and do our jobs in the best way possible, regardless of the various opinions around us. We cannot control each one’s opinion, but we can control how we react to this. We are responsible for our actions and not for what people think of us.

Q In your opinion has the regulator become too inflexible for the FX industry? Are they trying too hard to appease the European Union?

Maybe the Regulator seems inflexible for the FX industry, but I still believe that every ‘problem’ has its solution. It’s true that ESMA rules set a bunch of restrictions in the FX industry but in order to survive in the current regulatory environment, retail FX leaders will have to devote significant time to relationships with the right people. Fortunately, we now have technology that gives us the ability to quickly assess and identify the right people, what these people love, what they like to eat, drink, wear, play at, talk about, and more. Through social listening, retail fx companies can come to know the trader intimately, can build the FX educator’s business with truly helpful ideas, can spot potential pitfalls ahead of time, can know the right tone to take with prospective referral agents or

Andrea Papageorgiou Head of Legal and Compliance

affiliates, and can watch the trend of conversations at scale across regions in various languages. The point is for retail fx leaders must start to listen more and for longer.

Q If you had a time machine, would you still choose to be involved in the law?

Definitely, without any doubt or second thought..this is who I am and I am glad I found out who I wanted to become from a very young age.

Q What makes a good lawyer?

I will start from the skill of being a good listener and have good communication skills and critical thinking so as to be able to assess facts and reach reasonable conclusions. At times, there will be more than one reasonable conclusion, or more than one precedent applicable to resolving a situation. A good lawyer must therefore have the evaluative and analytical skills in order to choose which is the most suitable, based on the merits of each case. A good lawyer should also have an ongoing commercial awareness and be creative with an open mind, in the sense of finding practical solutions to any possible problem. Last but not least, I would say that a good lawyer and generally a good professional should strive for success through his/her determination to work smart and, sometimes, hard under a lot of pressure, being able to pay attention to every little detail without giving up on his ethics, beliefs and goals.

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Speakers Corner: I hate my Sales Manager How I almost bankrupted my brokerage ANONYMOUS

Hello everyone So I agreed to take on this article anonymously, I think one of the things that swayed me was not only my inert cowardice, but also to really vent my experiences of bei ng an owner of an FX brand. I think that most people see it as putting money in, taking a large amount out. However, from my experience it is more complex than that.

I think before we really get into the meat of what I wanted to cover, it is best to give you a bit about my background. I come from a modest background in the UK, where I sold from a young age and seemed to do above average.

What set me apart from my peers, I believe was the ability to hang in there when the dips came in my sales career, when others would mentally break I could push through. A lot of sales gurus will promise you there are these killer closing lines to use on your prospect to get them to melt like butter. In my opinion it is utter nonsense. If I was to give two tips to getting ahead is to listen to the prospect, and copy the successful people in your office.

think is good service, rather than the usual churn and burn aspect to FX, so really the jurisdiction should not matter. It only matters for me operationally getting payment services and other related services.

I built my brands based upon the wealth generated off my back. I have not inherited it, stolen it, laundered it, it is 100% all from my own work and laterally the partners who formed the group to make our other bands successful.

I think this gives you a good idea that it is a pretty solid group of companies, not just an institution run by wide boys, gangsters and megalomaniacs.

As an owner of other online ventures, there are a lot of skills that I can bring over to give me that head start when we built our brand. namely having an existing central online lead generation team, affiliate managers etc. So the leap was not that big.

I will be straight with you, I was very aware of retail FX however I never got involved as believe it or not, outside the FX bubble it does not have a great reputation.

In fact, when we began participating, I was staggered by the amount of snobbery from the FX ‘media’ who seem to think that all offshore is bad, but want to sell me ad space at inflated prices. Also liquidity providers who seem to have a sneering attitude to offshore brands, yet would sell their mothers to get my flow or offer me a rev share deal, which kind of runs counter to how they advertised themselves as being ‘transparent’.

To give ourselves the best opportunity to succeed, we operate a market making license from an offshore entity. The reason for this is twofold. The regulators have forced us to do this as they have become almost impossible to work with, Also let’s face it 98% of traders are gamblers who want the high leverage, so this is the only way I can give them what they want.

We have grown our business based on what I like to

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

Stepping into FX.

From an operational point of view, I always have my trusted lieutenant take up this aspect of the new business we begin. We have worked together for a long

time in other ventures. I trust them implicitly to do the things which I do not have the skill set for. They are the ball breakers of the organisation, but not in a way because they are weak people. They are like that as they are incredibly focused and results driven.

This will become more apparent later in this discussion how critical they are.

I can handle a lot of the ‘executive’ decisions which usually just involve looking over the contracts and signing the cheques. as I know that they have achieved the best price and conditions without annoying the supplier so much that they get a bad service as it is not worth it for them.

We filled the key roles with people of the highest calibre, great people who came with experience. We found that compliance and dealing room operations were easy to get an abundance of great candidates for...then we had to get the Head of Sales role filled.

Finding the Head of Sales.

This is where i started to break my own strict self imposed rules that had always worked well for me in the other parts of my organisation. I had never chosen the Head of Sales from outside, as I had it at the start of several of my organisations using my own network, and promoted from within.

People who had learnt the ethics and values that I wanted our brands to expose. Also they got the work ethic that the culture was looking to achieve. By this I always believe 100% in working smart, sure I like it when people work hard. But this usually comes from the passion of working in your brand.

Upon entering FX, I found out that this is where

all the bullshitters live. Every part of the ecosystem bullshits the other, whether it is based on costs of services, what their business does, how they can deliver it...every aspect bull shits. I know this goes for other industries, however I never came across this amount from my gaming brands.

In a way I kind of found it intoxicating, as normally my bullshit detector is very good. However, people do it to you so often in FX that it is like a double think, in that what they said cannot be untrue as only a crazy person would say it. Sadly this was not the case for me... with this we began our role for a Head of Sales Although I always believed that the key pillars of selling do not change, I was reliably informed that FX was different and more nuanced. A Head of Sales in FX requires a different skill set which cannot be found anywhere else. I went against my gut and listened to the ‘industry experts’.

Whenever I create a role, I want it to fulfill several criterias, such as it being financially rewarding based on performance and a decent salary. Moreover give them the ammunition to succeed, where we can give them more than enough leads and campaigns to get a very good head start. In my mind I will always be a sales person, so i know how critical it is to have the leads.

Anyone who does not have the budget for this at the start is really going to have a challenging time keeping their staff, and business open.

So with this in mind we contacted the usual headhunters for this role, as we are quite specific for our personality requirements. Having drawn a blank on that, which was maybe down to my fault of being too specific we opened it out to the generalist recruiters,

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which after a fruitless task and me becoming more desperate, as we had all the other roles filled, campaigns launched and we had already recruited 10 sales staff to get rolling. This is when I was referred to someone called John who would go on to become my head of sales.(name changed for this interview).

As I said prior, I was new to FX, and you can get thrown to the sharks in this industry if you are new to it. Something which I can openly say happened to me, and no doubt to some extent will do on several more occasions.

However, I met John, he seemed like a bit of a rough diamond that we could mould in our image. I think from this conversation you might be able to see that I believe in my ability to get the best out of people, and I know there is no perfect fit when it comes to having people join your organisation, as humans are very complex things when it comes to their interactions with each other.

The brand launched with our objectives outlined, i am a pretty reasonable person knowing that a sustainable business will not make huge returns in the first year in a mature market. Moreover, we are all selling the same product, just with differing levels of service. So assuming that you are going to be in the top ten and sustain that in the first year, is borderline psychopathic.

After three months, it looked like my rough diamond was coming good with each of our targets being exceeded way in advance of I could have imagined, and for that I do have to give kudos to a large part to John.

Part of my management style has been to give people the freedom to make their own future. There are some that like to be managed, and others like to go on their own initiative. Based upon what I saw from John he worked on his own initiative, working well with the sales team to bring results and with this we gave him more control over the sales process and the values that were amplified via the team outlining the brand.

With more responsibility, I like to reward the people involved more. Now this is where i would put it out to you, the reader. If this was a mistake I made as my next decision was based on previous experience, and forgetting that money can do odd things to people.

We set the next 3 months targets with great financial rewards on offer to all of the sales team. These are the types of rewards where they do not want to leave the company, and more importantly bring in other high quality staff based upon word of mouth.

I think my biggest mistake in setting this was two fold.

I was personally never interested in becoming good at sales for the money, it was always a game. If I win the game I will be rewarded very well for it. So the mistake I made was believing everyone had my values, which to my later detrimente was not the case. It has led me several times to think, is it good to have a sales team that is driven just by money. Does this create good practices?

So fast forward 3 months, we still had great results and a very driven sales team, then we started to see the online reviews and generally pissed off people posting on sites. As we all know it can happen for reasons that are not the brokerages fault. Moreover, with situations like this at first glance I am always

going to back my team. So i spoke with the dealing team to make sure that when people lost, it was not us screwing them over, as this is a crucial part to our marketing campaign that people are treated well.

A common theme posted was a conversation John had with the introducer, where he emailed a managed client instead of the money manager. The image was cut and pasted of ‘you have done a great job this month and outlined what he later goes on to confirm his commission that month. I think the Police call that bang to rights.

He had signed deals with ‘money managers’ where the accounts were managed and crashed. These were not small amounts of money, we are talking decent sized seven figure amounts. When you are a market maker this will make your results look fantastic in the first year of being open. I probably am culpable here to some extent as I did not monitor the deals, however at this stage of our working relationship, John had proved himself and he signed off all IB and affiliate deals.

We contacted as many as possible to have a discussion regarding what was happening, and this is when it all unravelled for John, and almost closed the brokerage.

Now I know that people reading this are probably saying that at the time as an owner ultimately that money goes in my pocket and you dont give a shit.

Well that is partly correct when the profit is made the right way. Plus there is no such thing as easy money, I have never seen a case of it ending well in the long term.

With a situation like this it is very hard to manage, especially when you can see that ultimately you are

culpable for it The conclusion to this was, we received a very stern warning from the regulatory jurisdiction (a legitimate warning) that they would revoke our license, along with a large fine, which if it was another brand I would say fair enough, so I have to apply that to myself as well.

As someone who got into this thinking that I can bring our organisational values to our FX brand, I was mortified as this is a terrible thing to happen to my reputation which I have fought to keep as clean as possible. In my eyes we were being labelled thieves, which is something I felt was the lowest thing that could happen.

Having come to a legal agreement with those who had been mishandled we paid back the money, plus legal fees, fine etc on top, we lost a significant amount of money. Needless, to say John was asked to leave based upon this.

I don’t want this piece turning into lambasting John for his actions, although he did play a huge role in what happened. What role did I play as the de facto leader of the organisation in setting targets and letting money be the main driver, with personalities who are just money driven, as opposed to those who want to win the game.

In an incredibly competitive industry filled with many shades of grey, I would be intrigued to know would you as the leader encourage a culture of greed or sustainability? What values do you like to bring to your organisation?

Thanks for reading this long story, it was better than a trip to a therapist

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Baer’s Crest LUDOVIC VUILLIER Founder Baers Crest

Come in from the cold with 2FavBuys from Baer’s Crest

Self reliance is considered to be an important quality in personal development. One of the reasons many people start their own businesses is to make it on their own and not be dependent on their employers.

However, if you are a business, at some point you are probably going to need service providers to enable you to sell your product to your customers. You may possibly need raw materials, manufacturing, logistics or any number of other types of suppliers. And as the ultimate aim of business is to get money for goods, a payment processing partner is vital.

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

But what happens when you are the “black sheep” of the business world and most payment providers will not work with you? It happens a lot, for a multitude of reasons. There you are, all good to go with your product, but you cannot get it to your customers because you cannot receive their money. What now? The entrepreneurial spirit wants to take a step towards self reliance.

Yet developing a solution for this particular problem is usually out of reach for most businesses. It takes time,

money and expertise, not to mention a mountain of compliance requirements. These barriers to entry are usually too high for the majority of businesses.

So what do you do when you need a payment processing solution, but you cannot do it yourself and the majority of providers give you the cold shoulder?

There is a solution. 2FavBuys offered by Baer’s Crest, a business consultancy with decades of experience, is a payment solution specifically designed for businesses with this particular problem.

2FavBuys is a straightforward and secure payment facilitator which works on a voucher based system for the full amount of the transaction. Vouchers can be purchased in a variety of currencies, including crypto.

The voucher code is sent to the purchaser using a secure Two Factor Authentication mechanism. Sellers

Ludovic Vuillier Baer’s Crest

have a dedicated dashboard and reporting system which is updated in real time, so the business has a clear and transparent view of their sales using the 2FavBuys system.

Onboarding is simple, technical integration is made smooth with a well documented API, and KYC requirements are handled by 2FavBuys. This coupled with highly competitive fees makes 2FavBuys an ideal option for businesses who would be left out in the cold by traditional payment processing providers.

2FavBuys even deals with the headache of disputes, so there are barely any chargebacks for your business to deal with.

So if traditional payment processors are inaccessible to your business, visit the Baer’s Crest website www.baerscrest.com and talk to us about how we can get you going selling your product.

PRIME TIME BREAKS RECORD WITH OVER 21,000 VIEWS! GCTV PRIME TIME Paul Orford

When we started Prime Time we were looking to take on some thought provoking subjects that others rarely touch on within our space. We have had wide ranging topics from giving you tips to see if your boss is a psycho, to how to use the latest AI tech to give your marketing department staggering results.

We set a new personal best with views with over 21,000 views on Linkedin, watching EP083 with Daniel Abdel Malak and Paul Orford discussing the future of human relationships with VR, and what it could mean for us all.

Maria Meramveliotaki

Constantinos Aristophanous

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

We like to take on subjects that challenge you, and hopefully make you think a little, so feel free to message us if there is a topic you would like to discuss.

Social media specialists reliably inform us that to help us grow our YouTube channel as we never paid much time to promote the channel.

You can support Game Changers TV by liking the videos, and subscribing to the channel.

Here are some pictures of our most recent editions..

Andrea Stefani

Daniel Abdel Malak

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Game Changers Magazine

Lifestyle

GC:LUXURY ANASSA HOTEL. Neo Chorio, Cyprus. www. anassa.com

Let’s face it everyone, we aren’t going to be moving around too much this December. So we have picked a local hotel that might be our saving grace when it comes to our slice of heaven we like to put in each edition of GC, for GC:LUXURY. Although the weather is a little cooler, we can still have the luxury of staying in a world class establishment over the Christmas period. Our pick for this is based on being effectively locked down all year, so being in a beautiful hotel with stunning views and world class views, we felt obliged to pick the Anassa Hotel in Neo Chorio in Cyprus.

For the uninformed Anassa means Queen in ancient Greek, and in GC’s view this is the most luxurious hotel in the country, although of you are also the owner of a 5 star hotel, feel free to let GC experience your hotel. We are open to persuasion.Based in Latchi in the Pafos region, which we regard as the most visually stunning and beautiful region in the whole country.

It may be a little cool to take a dip in the outside pool. however you can spend your time eating food forged by the hands of the world renowned chefs. A spa that will leave you in a Zen like state after having one of the many treatments on offer. To complement this, long walks in the winter sun experiencing some of the most spectacular nature that the country offers.

Like most of the GC staff members, we will not be travelling this Christmas to various nations. So why not spend that money on a suite,where you can get an immaculate space which is designed incredibly elegantly.

Based on our travels over the past few years, and staying in many 5 star locations, it does not have the usual over the top bling that you can find in some high end hotels. Although there is a lot of Greco style architecture, we did get the ambience that is often echoed the Hamptons.

One thing we will all have over Christmas is time, so why not spend it in luxury...

GC: DRIVE PAVLINA-KRISTINA IACOVIDOU Marketing & PR Manager A.I. Motokinisin LTD

Scientists declare the Taycan the most innovative car in the world Thanks to a total of 27 new developments, the Porsche Taycan is the most important innovation driver in the global automotive market. 13 of these, or almost half, are world firsts. These are the conclusions of the new AutomotiveINNOVATIONS Report published by the Center of Automotive Management (CAM).

Innovations in the electric Porsche recognised by the scientists at CAM include its 800-volt architecture, twospeed transmission on the rear axle, high recuperative power of up to 265 kW and best cd value in the segment (from 0.22).

The Center of Automotive Management (CAM) is an independent scientific institute for strategic consulting and empirical automotive and mobility research at the University of Applied Sciences (FHDW) in Bergisch Gladbach.

Under Centre Director Professor Stefan Bratzel, they have been analysing the innovations of global automotive manufacturers since 2005. In conjunction with the auditing and consulting company PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), they recognise the most outstanding innovations in their annual awards. Approximately 250 production vehicles were evaluated for 2019/20.

Thanks to a total of 27 new developments, the Taycan is the most innovative car in the world“We are delighted that our first all-electric sports car has so quickly achieved a place on the top step of the podium in the AutomotiveINNOVATIONS awards. This is fantastic confirmation of the innovative strength of our company and the pioneering spirit that can be found at Porsche,” says Oliver Blume, Chairman of the Executive Board of Porsche AG. “We have developed a new car with a new team and have built a completely new carbon-neutral factory.

Technical innovations such as our 800-volt architecture, recognised here by the award, permit short charging times. The two-speed transmission on the rear axle guarantees a unique driving experience. Both order book and customer feedback are very positive.”

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

Long list of awards in the main markets Winning the Most Innovative Model award continues a series of successes as the Porsche Taycan has already won around 40 international awards, above all in its principal markets Germany, US, UK and China.

For example, the electric sports car has been voted: •

World Car of the Year 2020 in both World Performance Car and World Luxury Car categories: World Car of the Year (WCOTY) Car of the Year: BBC TopGear Magazine (UK) Game Changer of the Year: BBC TopGear Magazine (UK) The China Green Car of the Year: Chinese Car of the Year (CCOTY) German Car of the Year (GCOTY)

• • • •

The Taycan was also awarded the prize for innovation by Connect magazine (Germany).

For more information contact:

+357 25 828911

A.I. Motokinisi (Limassol) Ltd 58-60 Ayiou Athanasiou Avenue Ayios Athanasios CY-4102 Limassol Cyprus

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GC:FEMME

Brand: Melekkis Jewellery Necklace 1.6 GR COLIE 18K WHITE GOLD WITH C: 0.10 AND 0.06 CT DIAMOND VS/SI/G Cost: €845

Brand: Melekkis Jewellery EARRINGS 18K WHITE GOLD WITH 0.30 CT DIAMONDS VS/G AND AGATE BLACK Cost: €1.527

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

Brand: Melekkis Jewellery 25,4 GR BRACELET 18K WHITE GOLD WITH 1,75 CT DIAMONDS VS/G Cost: €7.858

Brand: Alexandre Vauthier Name: High waisted tailored trouser Medium Shopper.

Cost: 700 GBP www.alexandrevauthier.com Picture credit: Alexandre Vauthier

Brand: Alexandre Vauthier Name: High waisted tailored trouser Medium Shopper.

Cost: 700 GBP www.alexandrevauthier.com Picture credit: Alexandre Vauthier

Brand: Melekkis Jewellery RING 18K WHITE GOLD CENTRAL 1,08CT VS/GH AND 0,46CT DIAMONDS VS/G Cost: €16.880

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PARTY LIKE IT’S 2019!

With the inevitable cancelling of Christmas parties by the global fun police, GC takes a look at what will be hot for the events for the close of the year if we were allowed to have a party!

Brand: Jimmy Choo Name: Leopard print bodycon mini dress Cost: €1,295 www.alexandrevauthier.com Picture credit: Farfetch

Brand: Alexander McQueen Name: No.13 105 wedge leather sandals Cost: €916 www.alexandermcqueen.com Picture credit: Farfetch

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

Brand: Jil Sander Name: Belted single-breasted coat Cost: â‚Ź2.790 www.jilsander.com Picture credit: Farfetch

Brand: Givenchy Name: Medium ID93 shoulder bag Cost: â‚Ź1.812 www. givenchy.com Picture credit: Farfetch P - 39

GC:HOMME With this year’s Christmas party probably being a Zoom based borefest.

One massive upside is that you no longer have to drunkenly smile politely at the HR drone.

Any damage to surrounding property is owned by you, leading to zero work based disciplinary...always an upside!

BRAND: Prada NAME: Stretch poplin shirt COST: 415 GBP www.prada.com PICTURE CREDIT: Farfetch

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

BRAND: Dolce & Gabbana NAME: Jacquard two-piece suit COST: 3300 GBP www.dolcegabbana.com PICTURE CREDIT: Farfetch

BRAND: Dolce & Gabbana NAME: Silk bow tie COST: 115 GBP www.dolcegabbana.com PICTURE CREDIT: Farfetch

BRAND: Gucci NAME: 1953 horsebit leather loafers COST: 535 GBP www.gucci.com PICTURE CREDIT: Farfetch

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Just Cavalli Watch €159 Melekkis Jewellery

Ring 18k white gold with 2.58 ct black diamonds and 40.32 ct Ruby € 14,699

Bracelet 18k Black Gold €4,289 Melekkis Jewellery

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

GC:EAT & DRINK DIONYSUS MANSION, LIMASSOL.

Address: 16th June Street 5, Limassol 3022 Facebook: www.facebook.com/dionysusmansion Telephone: 00357 25 222210

Writing this from our locked down city, it seems an age ago since we visited this place to review. Sat in a Monday morning fug of not being able to even sit in a McDonalds, writing about our trip to Dionysus Mansion a couple of weeks back seems like a different world, but it brings a smile to my face in anticipation of returning there.

For those who have not been there before, you can find it next to the Police Station and Post Office in Central Limassol, easy to find if you are from out of town by cab drivers and most map apps.Walking up to the old style white washed exterior, you are surprised how big the venue is, with a large rustic internal restaurant, and a wonderful fairy light covered garden to eat in for most of the year. However, with the weather getting cold at night, we would suggest waiting until things warm up a bit in the spring of next year.

Game Changers and our dining companion chose the location, based not only on the fantastic word of mouth reviews we have had. But also, every dish is sourced from local providers, something which is definitely reflected in the taste.Greeted by our friendly waiter, we take our seats indoors and begin with a Greek wine (Oreinos Helios Semeli), along with the spicy cheese spread, flavoured with paprika. Just the right size for a starter, which was soon to be accompanied by our mains.

GC was going to take the easy option of the 40 day aged steak, however opted for the stuffed duck fillet, marinated in orange liqueur with mushrooms and a kolokasi puree.

The dining companion of GC took the slow cooked pork shank, coming with sweet potato puree. This may all sound quite intimidating when you look at it on the menu, however, the real beauty of Dionysus Mansion is that it is very informal, where everything can be explained what is what on the menu. You do not get the fear of being embarrassed for asking what a dish is, unlike some places who want to give you a food quiz before they seat you.

Whilst waiting for our mains, one thing I have observed with social distancing is that it does have an upside of giving you a nice amount of space to enjoy a meal and discussion. Pre lockdown I often felt like I was crammed into a venue, and often felt like I was imposing on the tabe next to me!

With our mains done, they were the perfect size and no need for a desert, which from the menu looked great. Just another glass of wine to send us on our way home.

On reflection, this is a real jewel in the Limassol food scene, with high clabre food being served at very decent prices. The presentation matches the first rate taste with a great selection. One thing that I do think this city does struggle with is portion size, opting for huge amounts of food, when they can easily serve 30% less and you are very happy. Nice to see that Dionysus Mansion got this absolutely perfect.

In conclusion for this review, nothing cheers up GC more than a rustic cypriot building repurposed to eat traditional meats in....

Dionysus Mansion fits that bill perfectly. We would suggest booking in advance, also they do take out. I would always suggest getting it straight from the chef, not as a critique of the establishment, more to do with nothing beating that feeling of fresh food straight going to my stomach.

I am hoping that we will be able to return to civilization in the coming weeks, not only for my sanity, but also to review some of the new places Limassol has to offer. Message us if there is somewhere you would like reviewed.

GAME CHANGERS Issue #30

GC:FITNESS Guide to alternative treatments LUIS RIBEIRO Founder of Club Health www.clubhealth.uk

Alternative treatments are often misunderstood.

The reason? We are resistant to change. We like tradition, we like what we are used to and when something new comes to the surface, we are quick to dismiss.

Physiotherapy has been a victim of these tendencies and even though there has been huge progress in the field, it has yet to be fully embraced by the public.

At Club Health, we celebrate progress and we have no problem being at the forefront of introducing it.

Today, we will shed light on some amazing therapies that we will slowly introduce at the Club.

We will give you as much insights and information on these alternative treatments as possible but we would love for you to come by the Club, and have a chat over coffee. Our doors are always open and our staff always prepared to answer any questions you might have.

this subject, there is still no consensus or protocols on the effects and use of cold water therapy.

To make things even more interesting, in recent years, there have been developments in the field that make this type of alternative treatment even more intriguing.

What Is An Infrared Sauna?

Infrared saunas use electromagnetic radiation with wavelengths to produce heat within a confined space. Infrared light penetrates the skin and allows the temperature to rise, creating the desired result.

Infrared Sauna vs Regular Sauna?

Are you ready? Let’s dive right into it.

Unlike traditional saunas, infrared saunas heat the body from within rather than the air in the room.

That allows for a deeper heater penetration than a traditional sauna, which leads to more sweat, and efficient detoxification.

Alternative Treatment #1: Cold Water Therapy

Infrared Sauna Benefits

The idea of immersing yourself in iced, cold water is not novel. This is an alternative treatment that has been around for quite some time but what’s interesting to note, is its development.

As we have mentioned before, sauna benefits are well documented and there is a reason it has been part of healthy lifestyle routines for years. Infrared sauna has come to add to those benefits and make the sauna even more accessible.

In its foundation, cold water therapy used to be utilized as a cool-down method for athletes that had just finished a high-intensity workout session. In a nutshell, this was another iteration of a cold shower, but it seemingly gave athletes an elevated sense of recovery.

The roots of this notion can be traced back to 2008 and an issue of the International Journal of Sports Medicine where researchers found that cold water immersion helped with recovery.

This theory has since then been challenged and even though there has been many studies and research on

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Alternative Treatment #2: Breathing Work Breathing is not really a skill, is it? It’s one of those things everyone does, unconsciously without tracking it or paying attention to it, right? Yes and no.

Yes, breathing is an essential part of being and an action that happens without us realizing, without us trying. What if we told you, though, that breathing is a skill? That you can work on it and that there’s a lot you can gain from mastering it?

Let us explain.

What most of us don’t realize, is that there is a strong relationship between respiration and postural stability. We all think of breathing on face value – the process of inhaling oxygen to power our being.

Breathing is so much more than that. Here’s some interesting facts.

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For starters, the diaphragm has a dual purpose. It does have the basic respiratory function but at the same time, it initiates core stability through its impact on intra-abdominal pressure. It works in conjunction with the transverse abdominis, multifidus, and pelvic floor muscles to provide support to the spine.

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The control of breathing is divided between the central nervous system (brain and spinal cord) and the peripheral nervous system (somatic nervous system and autonomic nervous system).

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Inefficient breathing patterns are often closely associated with mobility restrictions.

Which brings us to the idea of controlled, deep breathing. Here are the benefits associated with controlled breathing techniques.

Breathing Regulates Blood Pressure Finding natural, non-invasive methods of alternative treatments that don’t require manufactured medicine, is the ideal scenario for any ailment.

When it comes to high blood pressure, research has shown that controlling your breathing and engaging in slow breathing patterns increases “baroreflex sensitivity,” a mechanism associated with blood pressure regulation.

Whilst breathing alone can’t be the sole reason blood pressure decreases, the research findings showed that if practiced regularly, controlled breathing can lower blood pressure and heart rate.

What that means is that you are immediately looking at a lower risk of stroke and cerebral aneurysm.

Controlled Breathing Boosts The Immune System Controlled breathing also affects the immune system. Researchers at the Medical University of

South Carolina found that the breathing exercise group’s saliva had significantly lower levels of three cytokines that are associated with inflammation and stress.

What further research has shown is that controlled breathing can: • • • •

Lower cortisol levels Lower blood pressure Improve the autonomic nervous system Improving arterial blood flow

Add all of these together and what you have is a toolbox of weapons to fight against diseases. Controlled breathing allows you to prepare your body against disease.

Controlled Breathing Stimulates The Lymphatic System Breathing is a major vessel of detoxification, by exhaling carbon monoxide. When it comes to inhaling, deep slow abdominal breathing helps you increase the amount of oxygen that enters your lungs.

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From the lungs the oxygen moves into your bloodstream where it binds to red blood cells and is transported to all the cells and tissue in your body. That process facilitates the movement of lymph through the bloodstream and dramatically increases the elimination of toxins.

Research has also shown that deep-breathing exercises are part of the treatment process for people affected by moderate to severe lymphedema.

Alternative Treatment #3: Mushrooms & Nootropics While mushroom and nootropic benefits for the human body have been around for decades, it’s only in the past couple of years that they started becoming mainstream.

The use of these natural substances is not necessarily used to treat ailments but rather to enhance and boost the mental capacity of healthy people. These substances are known to improve mental performance and more specifically memory, focus, creativity, intelligence, and motivation.

For a more in depth analysis about the origins, history and use of mushrooms and nootropics, feel free to watch this excellent video by Dr. Ramon Velazquez, Ph.D. Here is a more detailed breakdown of mushrooms and nootropics benefits: • • • • • •

Boost cognitive function Eliminate infectious bacteria Fight cancer Regulate blood pressure Safeguard the cardiovascular system Support liver function

People often mistake physiotherapy to just being the treatment of injuries, muscles and back aches. This is why Club Health came to existence. To change this perception and amplify the message that physiotherapy treats the cognitive and mental side of the human existence.

The body is an entire unit. Not just the legs, the arms or chest. It works in unison and introducing mushroom and nootropics supplementation will allow us to work on the body as a whole.

Our staff will be available at all times to guide you through each supplement’s purpose, ingredients and use in order to put your mind at ease about any objections or questions you might have.

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GC:SPORTS Esports: the gateway to the unreachable generation HARRISON DAVIS Esports Partnership Executive at Van Hawke Sports

With the sporting landscape being impacted dramatically in 2020 following the COVID-19 outbreak, digital marketing has never been so essential. Whilst the reach of sporting organisations is undoubtedly large, the assets which they can provide are heavily impacted with the lack of fans in stadiums. Alternatively, there is a formed desire for brands to reassess their partnerships to ensure they can maximise their marketing reach to the consumer.

In this ever-increasing demand for digital exposure, we have seen the emergence of a new market, one that has been steadily growing since the late 1990’s but has failed to gain popularity over the last 10 years. Esports, which refers to competitive video gaming presents a unique opportunity for brands to reach a high fanbase due to esports being a digitally native platform. Moreover, it resonates with a demographic that is increasingly difficult to reach, generation Z and millennials.

In esports, we can see something which is extremely rare and that is the formation of a new sporting market. Whilst on the surface this may not seem to be massively significant as there are countless sports globally that engage an audience, esports has something which every brand has an increasing interest to obtain. The engagement of a younger demographic. The audience is something that sets esports apart from not only most sports in its ability to reach new consumers for brands but from any traditional marketing platforms. The way in which younger people consume media content is vastly different from the average sports fan.

Following the formation of social media platforms and streaming subscription services, younger generations tend to engage less and less with the traditional forms of media in television and newspapers where those forms of marketing are somewhat

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redundant to younger people. In turn the average age of sports fans is increasing, leading to traditional marketing becoming less effective. According to the Premier League young adults brought just 4% of season tickets in 2017, a number which is a product of the increasing ticket prices and the challenges facing new fans acquiring tickets to matches.

Contrast that to the NFL where the average age of a match-going fan is 50 years old. Brands are in desperate need of a way to engage with a younger demographic.

There are a range of social factors which make the audience of esports so appealing for brands as the typical viewer in esports is someone that is highly educated with a modicum of expendable income. If we analyse the types of brands that are looking to enter the esports space recently it helps reaffirm this. Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Mercedes to name but a few of what would be considered premium brands have all entered into partnerships within esports, in an attempt to not only engage the esports audience now, but to install a brand identity within younger people so when they do come to a position where they are looking to purchase premium products there is brand familiarity which will ensure future customers.

Whilst the audience is a natural pull for brands, the conversation then shifts to what can esports provide in terms of marketing assets? Esports is an extremely new sector in the context of sports and marketing, which means brands may not be familiar to what the opportunities within esports are. Being digitally native, content that can be produced by an esports team or a tournament organiser is exponentially greater than what is replicable by traditional sports. Fans actively engage with their favourite teams and games for extended periods of time opposed to just match day. This means that

brands can get greater value out of their marketing assets as fans are actively engaging for longer.

As an industry, esports is still growing, whilst there are huge viewership figures formed in Asia, the western world is starting to take notice. With more structured competitions forming and a clear direction which the industry is taking to establish itself as a major sporting sector. Coupled with the fanbase growing rapidly as gaming is becoming more influential in today’s

upbringing, it is showing no signs of slowing down and we can only expect it to become an important tool for brands in helping them reach a previously unreachable audience.

Van Hawke Sports is a leading sports marketing agency, specialising in sports sponsorships for brands.

If you want to learn more about us and how we can assist you, contact us today.

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THE JOURNAL FOR INDUSTRY LEADERS

www.gchangersmag.com info@gchangersmag.com