Game Changers issue 39

Game Changers ISSUE #39

ASK IVA! GC speaks with Iva Bogicevic from Breinrock

GAME CHANGERS

DIRECTORY O1

Note from the editor

O2

Iva Bogicevic

O3

Paul Dalziel

View from the top. 03

Breinrock. 04-05

hoops AI. 06-09

O4

PSP Angels. 10-11

O5

EBO Virtual Assistant. 12-13

O6

XTB. 14-15

Viktoria Soltesz

Alexander Patsalides

Ashraf Drid

O7

Christina Barbash & Alexis Kokkinou

O8

Uri Gruenbaum

O9

David Ramil

1O

Point Nine. 16-19

TipRanks. 20-25

Powerful Reasons. 26-27

Nina Prlja 29-39

11

GC:EAT

12

GC:FEMME

Nammos-Dubai. 40-41

Christian Dior. 42-49

13

GC:HOMME

14

GC:FITNESS

15

GC:GOING OUT

Christian Dior. 50-57

58-59

60-61

VIEW FROM THE TOP It was great to visit Dubai whilst we were making this issue of GC, as we got to meet a lot of the contributors we had only met virtually over the preceding years. It was interesting to see how Dubai really is embracing foreign business to come and set up their, as Europe appears to be more and more challenging to get anything productive done.

The expo was good fun, where after a hectic couple of days we still had time to have fun and take advantage of the famous Dubai nightlife. We have a couple of articles covering where we visited, and we were lucky enough to have perhaps one of the finest meals I have ever eaten.

Thanks to this month’s cover star Iva Bogicevic from Breinrock, where GC has had a huge amount of traction from her ‘Ask Iva!’ articles that we have run over the past couple of issues. Iva is great to work with, and the Breinrock clients love her for her payments knowledge and her can do attitude…. bravo brate!

Thanks everyone for a great contribution.

Paul ORFORD EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Game Changers

Ask Iva! IVA BOGICEVIC Head of Payments at Breinrock

How local payments can make you international!

We had a great time in Dubai meeting you all at our booth, thanks to everyone who stopped by to say hello. One of the most common questions that we faced from those interested in our services, was regarding local payments.

Firstly, how is it possible that Breinrock offers so many, and secondly why does my current provider not offer me these?

It is probably best to take it into two parts to give you the best overview. Firstly, we can offer a huge selection of local routes based upon our relationships with our large banking network.

When you have access to twelve AAA rated banks, this gives us the ability to have high quality avenues for transactions that we can offer you as our client.

Secondly, with regards to your provider not offering these. This is perhaps a tough choice you must make between a ‘low cost’ provider, which perhaps just offers just a SEPA EUR account along with just one non-AAA rated bank in their network, not the twelve that we have!

That’s not to say that it you would classify it as a bad service based on this. Far from it. In fact, that might be the perfect fit if you are only making a couple of transactions a month.

However, if you are looking for a service that caters for both C2B and B2B, you will require something that is more robust within your banking infrastructure.

Having new local banking routes can no doubt open new international markets and solidifies relationships with clients and partners alike who need a solid local payment option. Yes, are paying for the privilege of having access to these routes. However, you are boosting your bottom line by being able to facilitate these transactions, also giving your marketing department new content to make on a local level to raise your profile.

Contact Breinrock to find out more, where we pride ourselves on offering you a consultative service which will optimize your brands transactions in our multi-currency accounts.

hoopsAI PAUL DALZIEL Business Development Manager at hoopsAI

From “play-by-play” to “tick-by-tick” A little over two years ago, Israel based startup, hoopsAI, signed a unique once in a lifetime deal with the National Basketball Association (The NBA).

Putting ink to paper at the end of 2019, the team’s love of sport (especially Basketball) made it a dream come true.

The signing of this deal would have seen hoopsAI delivering live in play data for the NBA, enabling “hoops” fans across the world to engage and keep up to speed with all courtside action, like never-before imagined. All content was to be generated in real time on multiple live games, and delivered to a global audience of millions, with all data being realized through a cutting-edge combination of AI (Artificial Intelligence), Machine Learning Technology and NLG (Natural Language Generation).

However, in March 2020, with a great deal of excitement and enthusiasm, as the team of long standing FinTech professionals and even longer-term sports fans, embarked on their passion project, they were hit by the same devastating health crisis that halted the entire world and brought everyone in all walks of life to a standstill and all live events & sporting activity seemingly to the brink of extinction.

But what was back then your average NBA fan’s loss has turned today into every day-trader’s gain. The team at hoopsAI (never ones to let momentous global events stand in the way of technological progress and innovation), have refocused their target market and brought the tremendous potential of AI and NLG to the financial markets. Combining cutting edge computer science with their own patent pending algorithmic technology, to make a slam dunk for content creation, delivering market news, analysis, and commentary in real time.

Game Changers caught up with Paul Dalziel, Business Development Manager of hoopsAI, to find out more.

Q Was it a difficult decision to turn away from Basketball and focus on finance?

It wasn’t easy. As sports lovers we were fully engaged in our technology, excited from meeting NBA team

GAME CHANGERS Issue #39

owners, and stars and feeling fully involved in one of the most amazing leagues in the world. I mean who wouldn’t be? But the team comes from a Fin-Tech background, so it made the transition easier. Also, the immediate and positive feedback from potential clients was so strong, that very quickly we understood there were more opportunities in the financial markets. Over the last two years there has been a striking rise in retail trading and investors’ expectations for enhanced digital experiences. This has led to an ever-increasing importance on the client engagement process. No matter what the consumer sector in question may be, the vital thing to get right is always the same thing, the creation of a user experience that is thoughtful and personalized. We believe that a big part of this is the ability to deliver content that is relevant and meaningful, that connects traders to the market, and by getting this right, platform providers can instill in their users much deeper levels of trust in the platform itself, which in turn empowers their clients to action.

Q How was it possible to adjust the technology from Basketball to finance? What have been the lessons learned?

The technology behind hoopsAI is Universal. Think of it as a smart machine that once it learns a domain it can analyze and communicate it. All we needed to do was “teach” our technology about the financial markets.

In a simplistic description - it is almost like a school for machines - we took a team of analysts and together with our data team trained the machine to “understand” the financial markets. From basic understanding of trends and cycles right up to fundamental and technical analysis.

Q Which perhaps leads us nicely to the technology behind hoopsAI, can you elaborate?

Our patent pending technology leverages machine generated insights and commentary to create customized stories, such as market news, real time updates, technical and fundamental analysis, and a whole host of financial market commentary, covering Trends, Top Movers, Earnings Reports, Record Highs, and a whole

lot more. We employ the use of NLG (Natural Language Generation), infographics and more to transform knowledge and data into narratives that are easy to comprehend and consume. All in real time and personalized to each reader, all AI driven with no human intervention.

Q Which means no more human analysts and content writers? Should we be worried that “the robots are coming”? ha-ha no, no, as I said before, it’s an opportunity not an obstacle. In depth market research and personal opinions will always have a demand, however even the best analysts and content writers can’t keep up with the need and pace of the financial markets in real time.

Another challenge is coverage of all assets - the long tail of stocks is already challenging, not to mention all the additional assets available in the market today. As an example, you can always find an article analyzing Tesla - sometimes even from the last hour. However, if you check online for available content analyzing one of Tesla’s “smaller” competitors - say - Ford - you will be amazed that no one covers it. You will again get Tesla stock coverage. hoopsAI provides platforms with the opportunity to provide comprehensive coverage of all their assets in real time, rather than arbitrary snap shots at the beginning of each trade session. Working with us also gives brokers the opportunity to personalize their content such as watchlist coverage and much more.

Paul Dalziel Business Development Manager at hoopsAI

P-7

Q In your opinion, what are the most effective methods for connecting with end users?

Recent 3rd party studies have shown that whether the engagement experience was delivered via email, SMS or through in-app notifications, end users prefer brands that have a confident and coherent communication strategy and display a deeper understanding of their needs. At hoopsAI we believe this must go double for the finance industry, where participants are investing money, often connected to their dreams, and aspirations. Investors need to be kept aware of market news and insights, when they are trading or researching, in real time, on-demand and personal.

Q So, what do brokers have to do to achieve all this?

The biggest challenge for any financial institution is how to design workflows that make it a trusted and preferred destination for investors; we suggest that they can strengthen this by providing a compelling combination of breaking news, key insights, and market commentary at the right time and with easy access, and in addition, personal analysis that empowers traders to better understand the markets and engage with the platform.

Q Often traders can be bamboozled by market events, what makes you able to engage traders that might otherwise not enter the market?

That’s exactly the point, the financial markets often change direction in an instant, leaving investors confused and disconnected from trading, leading to client inactivity. How often have we heard the expression paralysis by analysis? It has become a bit of a cliché but it’s very often the case that brokers have a great deal of demo clients but a very low ratio of active traders. We want to help traders to understand the markets better, get real time updates and feel nurtured and qualified to make investment decisions.

Q Would you suggest then that Brokers must invest in new processes, and technology to level up?

That’s a great point, there are in fact massive dividends for brokers who adopt new technologies to enhance their engagement campaigns, after all it’s clearly apparent from all the relevant research and from the experiences we have had over the years and the feedback we get from our clients. When brands engage with their users through innovative, dynamic, and impactful processes, they enjoy much higher returns. Investing in smarter working practices and technologies enables exponential growth across all key metrics.

Q So, are you saying content is king?

Yes, that’s exactly what we believe, and all the evidence suggests that we are right.

Well, that’s reassuring!

But look while of course it is undeniable that platform useability as well as fees, play an important part in any investor’s decision-making process of which broker to trade with, it is information that ultimately moves the financial market, so rightly a premium should be attached to insights that connect traders with the markets in more impactful ways, in fact, a recent J.D. Power survey of 6,500 investors in the USA found that it was “investment information and research” that consistently ranked as the top reason investors visited a broker’s website. So, presenting traders with highly relevant, authoritative news that puts the how and when of it all, in context with the corresponding movements of the market, will inevitably develop user-trust, and ultimately lead to improved time on the platform.

Q Thanks for giving us an insight into hoopsAI and your company’s background and the reasons behind what you are doing, is there anything you would like to say to wrap up?

Thanks very much, it’s been a pleasure. I would like to add that we believe in developing long term partnerships with our clients. We research and find tailored solutions for the financial institutions we work with, and we are excited to hear ideas and thoughts of how to implement our technology, and by working together with our clients to make those ideas a reality. It’s an exciting time to be delivering quality content and we are looking forward to assisting your readership with leveling up their output.

Our contact details: +44 (0)203 883 1284 paul@hoopsai.com www.hoopsai.com

Ha-ha yes, and in which case we like to think, if content is king then Natural Language Generation is its crown…

P-9

PSP Angels VIKTORIA SOLTESZ Founder & CEO of PSP Angels

Crypto - friend or foe?

Let me tell you a story.

My old client, deep in his 60s, being the CFO of a wellrespected and very traditionally managed shipping company, called me one day, and asked for my help.

“Viktoria I can see you are very into Bitcoin” he said “I want to introduce Bitcoin as a payment method. Let me know how I can I open that Bitcoin thing….you know, the vault…the bank account” “The wallet” “This is how you call it? Yes that. How does it work” I got it. He wanted to keep up to date with the latest trends. Even though it was clear he has no idea about blockchain I respected his ambition and curiosity for the new trends.

“How many of your client wants to pay you with crypto” I asked “None” “So why do you want this” “I want to be in the future” More and more clients want to follow the trend because of FOMO but is it really a good thing? While we advertise mass adoption, how can be sure that we don’t lose more than we win?

We all need to maintain trust and great communication with our bankers as nowadays a good and reliable bank account can be our most valued supplier. So first, we need to consider their take on our new innovation.

And if they don’t follow suit, we might be the one who draw the short straw.

My company, PSP Angels is a high risk payment consultant company, which means we deal with higher risk clients who usually have difficulties to get accepted by the traditional payment and banking methods.

It’s a no brainer that many of these clients want to take advantage of the ease, lower fees and speed of the new technology. Many times its not necessarily a choice, but more like a force. Turning crypto into actual fiat, on a high street bank account can be a real hassle and finding a bank which is “crypto friendly” might be an expensive challenge.

GAME CHANGERS Issue #39

So, we would think, banks are here to get the blame by not being up to date with crypto. We might also believe, instead of helping, they seem to make life more difficult for not adapting a new technology and refuse to enter a new world of blockchain. But are they really? We must remember, banks are also businesses, and they need to balance the cost with their benefit to present profit for the shareholders (which can be easily your parents via their life insurance or pension funds) Crypto transactions are a hot topic for compliance, simply because many banks still don’t have the tools and means to check the source of funds and make sure that the amounts, which are flowing through their accounts, are indeed from a credible source, and taxed accordingly. Additionally, everything is changing on a daily basis when it comes to regulation, so it’s almost impossible to keep up to date with the news where crypto is legal, up to what amount, taxed (VAT-d even!) or in any other way legit. This means, if a bank or a payment institution reject your crypto cashout or block your funds, this means you cost more to them than you benefit via your banking fees.

But how does it affect my CFO client?

Let’s say he opens a wallet. There might be some of his clients who are a bit more tech savvy and transfer payments to this wallet. Let’s say his accountant also understands the flow and turns this to fiat in an affective and cheap manner. Let’s also say this crypto is less than 0,5% of this yearly income. Does it worth it?

Maybe not.

As per my experience, even if the bank accepts the funds (when he transfers from crypto to fiat and want to cash out from the exchange) there is a good chance that this one transaction might affect his existing his banking relations in an adverse way.

Now his company might be placed to a higher risk category due to this “crypto trading activities”, and even there is only one small transaction, traditional banks might charge higher fees for him, reject his credit request or even close his account. This can make a mark on his credit history and lead to further rejections in the future.

Even if he has a crypto friendly account, he might need to verify the source of all micro transactions, while this might not have been the case with traditional fiat ways (ie 500 EUR from a crypto exchange might trigger a compliance check while a 100 000 EUR “traditional” fiat transfer not, due to his account history) Does this worth the hassle?

Personally, I am a firm believer of mass adoption and enhancement of blockchain and therefore crypto payments. I believe that the world is changing regardless we want it or not, and the easiest way is to change with it. But we still need to consider the benefit vs the cost when it comes to our operation. I suggest to trust the professionals when making any changes and only make decisions after you considered all risk, cost and future implications.

We have several amazing crypto processing and OTC partners who provide excellent service on low cost and secure conditions. They even help you to open the “that Bitcoin thing….you know, the vault…the bank account” The future is here. Your job is to make sure you join it at the right time.

Viktoria Soltesz P - 11 Founder & CEO of PSP Angels

EBO Virtual Assistant ALEXANDROS A. PATSALIDES Director - Financial Services Division alex.patsalides@ebo.ai www.ebo.ai/industries/financial-services

Q How have you avoided it not just becoming another brand that uses AI as a buzzword to get attention?

There’s a lot of AI hype which unfortunately ‘hides’ the real discussions we should be having around business benefits, or the tough questions we need to discuss about AI bias, ethics and human agency. Hype shifts the discussion away from AI literacy to marketingspeak, which is deplorable.

EBO has consistently focused on ensuring that AI engenders trust and have wide societal acceptance.

For this to occur we take time to explain key AI concepts (like classification and confidence levels, ethics and fairness in machine learning), for our nontechnical audiences. And we do this in simple terms to allow anyone to follow.

We get attention because the technology we build is pioneering and world-leading, but most importantly it makes complete business sense.

Q Does this help every owner of an online brand achieve full automation in their support department?

Yes. We allow Customer Service personnel to focus on the complex, while our Virtual Agents handle the repetitive.

EBO works to make a real impact, that can be seen in the every-day running of a business. This isn’t about ‘digital transformations’ or new world trends that claim to revolutionize the future. It’s about today’s business problems.

Q I have been stuck in support bot hell several times.

How is your product different, and can it take away this frustration?

EBO has developed through Machine Learning, one of the most advanced Virtual Agent models in the world.

At the same time, we’ve worked with large enterprise to understand their challenges and tailor our products to a range of business requirements.

Today our Virtual Agents understand what your customers are saying but inform you about the context of what they’re not saying. This is an incredible differentiator and removes the frustration often experienced with ‘dumb’ solutions that cannot infer meaning. Therefore, EBO enables seamless end to end journeys that deliver better onboarding, retention and re-engagement.

Q How do you teach your software to understand the needs of a new client?

We know that businesses have lots of problems, but they also have lots to work with. We work closely with clients to integrate with what they’ve got - making use of their existing systems, processes, data and customer knowledge to improve customer interactions.

The great thing about AI today is that it is more ‘intelligent’ than ‘artificial’ and therefore it allows us to train our Virtual Agents from a very small dataset. Once launched, a Virtual Agent is continuously learning how to better perform tasks accurately and efficiently.

Q How hard is it to integrate to your existing software?

EBO’s solution is interoperable – it integrates well with existing platforms in the industry, making the roll-out painless. Most IT projects are still too complex for today’s fast-moving world. CTOs rarely

Alexandros A. Patsalides Director - Financial Services Division at EBO

have capacity to deliver all the projects necessary for the business so EBO is built to make the CTOs decision to choose us – easy.

More so, because EBO is close to the industry it is pre-integrated with most existing software used in our main sectors. In the financial services sector, we are completely interoperable with the main products in use whether it’s a Microsoft solution, a CRM product like Salesforce or ZenDesk, ERPs of other backoffice solutions.

Q How close are we to having a support system that has equal knowledge that of a human?

AI is ‘intelligent’ in pure, algorithmic computational sense. Yet despite the increased level of intelligence and autonomy, the hypothetical claim that AI can attain capabilities such as human consciousness (although definitions of ‘consciousness’ vary) is presently unfounded.

Pure intelligence (thinking about thinking) has subjective, first-person causal powers and is not inherently computational the way computer programs are.

The human mind has a number of intrinsic characteristics, such as subjectivity, intentionality, teleology and rationality, which a computer can only simulate.

Subsequently machines do not have access to the metaphysical nature of reality. Mirroring reason is not the same as reasoning. And reasoning is not the same thing as consciousness.

Therefore at EBO we like to think that we must carefully examine which processes should be automated via AI and which should remain 100% human.

Q Do you think this will make humans irrelevant in a support department over the next few years?

Most of what we do at EBO presents an opportunity to augment tasks done by humans. Thus we augment and not replace human agency. Nevertheless, it is likely that some jobs will go whilst others will be created. The traditional support department function will change and the repetitive, mundane tasks will (and already are – through EBO) being moved to AI. It’s also interesting to note that the World Economic Forum predicts that by 2025 a total of 97m jobs will be created, with Data Analysts & Scientists & #AI and #MachineLearning Specialists leading, while 85m jobs will be lost, with ‘Data Entry Clerks & Administrative & Secretaries’ the most impacted. The net gain is to be noted as it is indicative of a new vibrant economy with new role requirements.

P - 13

XTB ASHRAF DRID Senior Executive Officer at XTB

Q Why MENA is one of the main regions for XTB? As you know, the MENA region is very important with 19 countries that make up 578 million of the world’s population. UAE has recently joined the top financial hub countries in the world and was ranked the most attractive financial center in the MENA region. The Middle East seems to have a very positive future with regards to fintech in addition to so many promising plans yet to come true and this is mainly why I chose to have the office in the MENA region.

Q Recently there have been a fair few changes that have been implemented in the UAE in regards to doing business. For example, implementing tax and changing the workweek, why do you think these changes are taking place?

The UAE, and Dubai specifically, welcomes everyone. I think this is exactly why the working days were changed to Monday-Friday. This is to work in conjunction with the rest of the world and when financial markets are open. Similarly, because the UAE is open to the whole world, the implementation of the new corporate tax came to increase the government’s revenue which will mean increased spending on the country, and thus the UAE’s market stays refreshed, as there’s a continuous flow of money taking place.

Q We’re already a quarter of the way into the year and it seems we’ve left one crisis behind just to move into another. How do you see the unrest in Europe affecting running a business in the Middle East?

Of course, we all live on one planet, and everything is so interrelated. Everything going on in the West does affect markets and the Middle East as a whole. I believe that this is mainly related to the UAE being an importer of many agricultures like wheat, corn, coffee, and more. Thus, any effect in the supply of their products will have a compound effect on the whole world.

Q We understand that XTB is working on unique trading platform technologies. Can you let us know a little more about what you’re working on?

The company has been using Xstation for so many years now. Xstation has a very simple intuitive design and is very easy to use. It has transparent charts that make it easy to manage your account.

GAME CHANGERS Issue #39

Q What else can we expect to hear from XTB in the coming months?

I will leave it for XTB to show you the answer to this with time. But all I can say is there will be so many exciting new things so keep an eye on our website and socials always.

P - 15 Ashraf Drid Senior Executive Officer at XTB

Point Nine CHRISTINA BARBASH & ALEXIA KOKKINOU BDM & Head of Client Success at Point Nine

Q Tell me about yourselves, your background, and your current role at Point Nine.

such as MMSR. We are aiming to give more back to our society through our CSR.”

Christina: “I’m originally from Ukraine and moved to Cyprus 16 years ago. I had been working in the Forex industry for seven years before I joined Point Nine. During my tenure in the Forex Industry, I had heard about the Fintech and Regtech industry and immediately became interested in it. It was then that I decided to make a change. Today, my role at Point Nine is Business Development Manager. I help bring in new business and partnerships to the company.

We work hard to establish partnerships with different companies that will allow us to grow further.”

Q You have been working at Point Nine for a long time. Describe to us how Point Nine started to offer Trade & Translation Reporting services. What were the big obstacles along the way? How did you manage to establish Point Nine as one of the premier providers in this industry?

Alexia: “I studied Mathematics and have a Master’s degree in Actuarial and Finance Mathematics. I joined Point Nine as an Operations Analyst offering middle and back-office services to Funds, Hedge Funds, Investment Banks, amongst others. Two years later, I was transferred to the regulatory reporting department of the company as a Client Success Manager.

Following the acquisition of Point Nine from MUFG, I was offered the Head of Client Success at Point Nine Data Trust. One of the primary responsibilities of our team, among other things, is to understand our clients’ requirements, assist them with their reporting operations, and deliver solutions that are aligned with their business requirements and specifications.

According to our clients’ needs, we will onboard them and liaise internally to adjust our system on our clients’ bespoke business rules. The maintenance of our clients’ reporting processes is one of our top priorities; hence we are in constant communication with them to eliminate and mitigate any issues or exceptions that may arise.”

Q What are the plans for 2022 for Point Nine?

Christina: “Our goals for 2022 include growing our market presence through strategic alliances. Along with that strategy, we want to grow our team of Point Nine-ers. We are also in the process of increasing our product and service coverage to all major jurisdictions, including USA, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Canada and also add more EU/UK reporting regimes,

GAME CHANGERS Issue #39

Alexia: “When the founders of Point Nine met two of the most capable professionals in the RegTech industry, they saw it as an opportunity to expand our service offering to clients. At the time, RegTech was in the early stages of development, and recruiting these experts turned out to be a great decision. These two professionals are now the partners, the CEO, and CP&TO of Point Nine Data Trust.

The complexity of the reporting requirements and specifications, and the large number of required fields to be reported were among the difficulties we had to overcome. The guidelines that were initially provided by the authorities were vague and kept changing continuously through the years—something that still happens. Point Nine personnel now have the knowledge and expertise to untangle regulations and understand and implement the updates and amendments for each regulatory regime. We relied on our team of experts in every aspect and managed to become one of the leading companies in the RegTech industry.”

Q What exactly does Point Nine offer?

Christina: “Point Nine Data Trust is an industryleading team of experts specialising in trade processing and reporting. We serve as a dedicated regulatory reporting firm focused on providing trade and transaction reporting services to legal entities across the globe. Point Nine works with financial firms—both on the buy- and sell-sides—financial services providers, and corporations to help them ensure high-quality and accurate reporting to remain compliant with EU and UK (EMIR, MiFIR, SFTR), Australia ASIC, and Switzerland FinfraG. Point Nine also maintains 100% accuracy in MiFIR, SFTR, and 99.95% accuracy in EMIR / ASIC reporting.

Through the years, ever-evolving financial services landscape, and changing regulatory requirements, Point Nine has learned how to best support clients to ensure their success. As a result, we have developed processes, platforms, and policies to ensure that each and every client receives timely and best-in-class support when they need it most.”

Q What makes your service different than the competition?

Alexia: “Apart from our solution’s ‘unlimited’ capabilities, our day-today dedicated support to our clients makes our service reliable and high quality. Our system is flexible and adjustable to our clients’ needs and can be integrated with any data source such as trading systems, order management (OMS), or back-office systems. We proactively enrich our validations prior to report submissions, hence the exceptions received by the TRs/ARMs/NCAs are minimal.

In a few words, our driven customer support team combined with our leading-edge technology sets clients up for success.”

P - 17 Christina Barbash BDM at Point Nine

Q Alexia, describe to us the process after Christina signs a new client. How much do the two of you collaborate?

Q Which type of clients do you work with, Christina?

Is there a specific market segment in which you’d like to see P9’s presence grow?

Alexia: “The business development team will provide us with the necessary information regarding our new client’s business activities. We will arrange a meeting with the client to establish the foundations, gather the rest of the necessary information, and perform a demonstration of our system.

Christina: “Because of my background in the Forex industry, I’m currently concentrating more on retail Forex brokers . We have already signed contracts with many large brokers but we want to expand our client base. Our clientele includes regional banks, big corporates, high-frequency trading firms, fund managers, and investment firms.”

Once the agreement between Point Nine and the client is signed, the Solutions Implementation team will connect with the client’s designated point of contact to kick off the onboarding process. Our team then analyses any documentation and business rules provided by the client and coordinates with the software development team for the implementation. We then send results to our client for review and confirmation. Once everything is in place, reporting moves to production. The two departments collaborate not only during the onboarding of a new client but also when a client needs to amend the agreement due to business changes.”

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Q What advice can you give to a newly established company to become successful?

Alexia: “I am not an expert in business growth strategies, but I could share some insights based on my experience with Point Nine. Recruiting the right people and investing in them are key to the success of a newly established company. A passionate and dedicated team will drive the company forward. Listening to your clients, learning to put yourself in their shoes, and taking the time to truly understand their needs will allow you to create an excellent product for them, which in turn, will lead to growing your clientele. Being flexible and willing to adjust to an ever-changing market will help you to maintain a competitive edge.”

Alexia Kokkinou Head of Client Success at Point Nine

Your Trusted Partner in Trade & Transaction Reporting Point Nine is a dedicated regulatory reporting firm, focusing on providing trade and transaction reporting services to legal entities across the globe.

For a best-in-class service using state of the art technology and with a proven track record of submission success, Point Nine is your trusted partner in trade and transaction reporting.

Peace of mind with our end-to-end solution

Our in-house technology, is a scalable regulatory solution utilized by many firms.

We have processed and reported more than 7 billion reports and have served over 100 legal entities to date.

Our technology is designed to help firms successfully meet their trade and transaction reporting requirements and remain compliant.

Point Nine Approach

Mapping ◆ Validations

EMIR ◆ MiFIR

Bespoke Business Rules

ASIC ◆ SFTR

Enrichment ◆ Eligibility UTI Management Pre-Matching Exception Management

PLATFORM

Transformed data

FinfraG

Feedback

Reports

Report

SOURCE DATA

END POINT

T+1

Beyond Reporting Excellence!

Developed in

100% Cloud-Based

Security Guaranteed

Get in touch with us: www.p9dt.com | info@p9dt.com | +357 25833800

TipRanks URI GRUENBAUM Co-founder & CEO of TipRanks

Q Can you give us an outline of the history of TipRanks?

Back in 2011, when working as a software engineer and investing as a hobby, I followed some bad advice from an analyst that was published on a leading website. Six months later, I’d lost half of my investment. I wanted to understand what went wrong.

I researched this analyst whose advice I had followed, and after writing down every recommendation he had given online, and measuring how it performed, I realized he got it wrong most of the time.

This experience drove me to find a way to use technology to create financial accountability. To be honest, I couldn’t believe it didn’t already exist, and so that was the starting point.

When we launched TipRanks in 2012, we provided a service that enabled retail investors to see how analysts rank based on their performance, rather than on the prestige of the bank they work for. This was a completely new concept. The service quickly became the standard in Wall Street and is used by most banks.

We leveraged our popularity and strong tech capabilities to launch more unique datasets and research tools. Our focus is on giving retail investors the same research power as the biggest asset managers through simplified tools and alternative data.

Additionally, today, more than 50 global institutions, including TD Bank, Morgan Stanley, eToro, Nasdaq, Santander, CIBC, TMX, and others, integrate our products onto their platforms to enable their users to make educated data-driven investment decisions.

Q Just to be explicitly clear, you are not offering financial advice or a signals service to anyone. Can you elaborate more on how you work?

That’s right. TipRanks is a tech company, or more accurately a fintech one, as we operate in the finance field. We don’t offer financial advice; there are plenty of top-performing experts doing just that, and one of the features we offer is enabling investors to follow

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them. Rather, we make it easy for retail investors to conduct their own research using institutional-grade tools.

We do this through financial big data. Our technology scans and analyzes all finance-related news, corporate filings, analyst research, and social media and transforms terabytes of data into simple, visual tools that investors can use in their stock analysis and research. To do this, we use natural language processing technology, machine learning, and AI. We’ve been honored to win a number of industry awards based on the strong capabilities of our technology.

The result is a suite of simplified research and analysis tools. All our features are presented visually and are also interactive and intuitive to use. We regularly add new features, for example in the past few months, we added data about website visitors of companies whose online presence is essential, as well as an exciting feature that shows changes to companies’ risk factors as reported to the SEC. Retail investors of all levels use TipRanks tools. They are simple enough for the most inexperienced investor while being of immense value even to the most experienced investor. In fact, TipRanks powers Nasdaq’s Smart Portfolio offering.

Q Your brand offers credibility by having contributors assessed on their correct recommendations.

How do you do this?

Our Financial Accountability Engine™ assesses financial experts based on three factors. The first is their average success rate, in other words, the percentage of an expert’s ratings/ transactions that result in a positive return, usually measured after one year, the second is their average return per stock rating/ transaction, again with a one-year default, and the third is the statistical significance of the ratings/ transactions, as the more activity, the more significant the results.

Although our default is to measure experts over one year, you can also use TipRanks to see how they perform over different time frames and sectors.

Uri Gruenbaum Co-Founder & CEO of TipRanks

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Q How can an individual become a contributor?

We currently track and rank over one hundred thousand experts, including Wall Street analysts, financial bloggers, corporate insiders, and hedge fund managers as well as close to six hundred thousand individual investors.

We capture insider and hedge fund transactions through their reports to the SEC. We track analysts and bloggers online and also invite them to submit their reports directly to us, which many do. Any blogger or analyst can approach us if they think we have missed them. However, this is rare. We seem to capture most active experts.

We also rank individual investors. This is done through our Smart Portfolio service. We aren’t a broker; so, we enable investors to sync their portfolios with their bank or broker to see a full portfolio analysis as well as what the experts say about their holdings, and of course how they rank. Any individual investor who wants to see how they fare can open a Smart Portfolio on TipRanks for free.

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Q Is there a specific type of brand who uses your service?

Brands that are forward-thinking and looking to enrich the digital experience of their clients choose TipRanks.

Q You have a number of very large brands as clients, is this relevant to the retail end user?

We know that brokers that incorporate TipRanks onto their platforms, report increased client engagement, as measured by time on tool, higher trading volumes, and improved retention. So, our partnerships are relevant to the end-users who leverage our tools to make data-driven investment decisions.

Q More brokerages are giving clients access to buy stocks, as LPs have given them the ability to do this.

Would your brand be a good fit for this type of brokerages?

We pride ourselves on our ability to tailor make solutions for all our clients.

Q By using your service, does it not also act as a great service for the client, but also helps the marketing department have new content to present?

sold stocks recently, which can be extremely powerful data, when it comes to informative trades, i.e. those that reflect sentiment.

It’s always exciting to announce new partnerships and of course, our marketing department always likes a story to share. However, the bottom line for us is always how we can bring retail investors the tools and data they need to make smart investments.

For those looking for new investment ideas, we have a large choice of tools and screeners that are fully open to Premium users and are a huge help in identifying stocks with the most positive indicators.

Q From an individual user perspective, what value does your premium service offer me?

There are some features that we offer to everyone, as it’s important to us that anyone can check how an expert ranks based on their performance track record or see the analyst rating consensus and price target of a stock.

However, Premium, our most popular subscription unlocks a huge amount of data. Going back to analyst forecasts, with Premium you can filter the data to only focus on the top-performing analysts’ ratings and price targets, as well as see a list of analysts who have most recently rated the stock, alongside their price targets, and performance track record, both overall and on a per-stock basis. Premium also unlocks more stock analysis such as which insiders have bought or

Q How hard is it to integrate to your brand?

We have an extremely talented and hardworking team that works with our clients to tailor our tools to their your needs. iFrames literally take moments to integrate – they are a fast and pain-free way to merge our interactive tools, which we custom build to ensure they appear completely native. Naturally, we have a robust REST API solution which can handle many thousands of calls.

Q What’s the best way to reach you for more information?

The direct channel to our sales team is sales@tipranks.com. I invite your readers to follow us on LinkedIn as well as our other social media channels, where we can also be reached.

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GAME CHANGERS Issue #39

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Powerful Reasons DAVID RAMIL Powerful Reasons

Q Can you explain more about your charity Powerful Reasons?

Powerful Reasons is not just my entity, it is an inclusive organization that looks to help as many people as possible and that also wants to be an organizational model based on the search for excellence, in the style of the Nordic countries. We are not looking for charity projects, we want to develop high-impact, self-sustaining projects, in line with the SDGs and the UN 2030 Agenda. I am not Onassis, I was born in a small town in Galicia and 6 years ago I was cleaning glasses in Malta despite having higher education and when I started this project I only had my salary of 1,700 euros net per month. After 11 months we have 12 people helping in the organization, with great training who contribute from different parts of the world such as Spain, USA, Nepal, Kenya, Cyprus, Mozambique or Cambodia. If we continue growing, I am convinced that we will contribute through this entity to the beginning of an essential world citizen reaction if we want to save humanity and the planet.

Q What motivated you to start the charity?

When you have a easy life and apart from that you also suffer a rare disease, when you worry about yourself but also about your surroundings because the tears of others hurt you as if they were your own, when you travel to Syria with ISIS active, in the middle of the war with a clandestine visa, and you look into the eyes of mutilated children, or families destroyed due to purely economic decisions of the company-states in collusion with large international corporations, when you travel to Ukraine and your body trembles sharing the fear of people a few days before the outbreak of a war, when every five seconds a child dies of hunger in the world, when malaria or tuberculosis are fully curable pandemics that kill twice as many people each year as COVID-19, yes, the COVID-19 of the pharmaceutical companies that go up on Wall Street as more injections they sell but they don’t have the decency to allocate part of their profits to people who can’t pay for the more basic medicines, when every day a woman is squandered in Saudi Arabia or Qatar and that country is awarded a World Cup because its oil commands more than fundamental human rights, when you understand that Adam Smith’s thesis that selfishness of individuals will lead to general welfare is just a dead letter, when you see that in the capital-

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ist world there are invisible lines of reasoning like in neighborhoods of Glasgow that do not exceed 54 years of life expectancy, you realize that you have to do something now. It is my responsibility to try to leave the new generations a better world than the one I have found, just as our parents and grandparents have tried to do. And we’re going to get it.

Q Why did you choose to integrate blockchain technology?

We are proud to say that we are the first non-profit organization in the world that has Blockchain in its own ecosystem to guarantee maximum transparency in any action. The donor can see the outflow and inflow of money in a totally clean and unhackable way, monitor the projects they support and see the impact of their help. Right now the web fuertes-razones. org is undergoing reforms precisely to optimize this technology. Until within approximately a month it will not be fully functional again.

Q Can you outline the courses that you run?

One of our sources of self-financing is the courses taught by specialists who belong to Powerful Reasons. In that sense we are very chameleons. By having a multidisciplinary team we are lucky to offer very varied themes. From how to create a social company, expert courses on the 2030 Agenda and Sustainable Development Goals, coaching courses to reduce worker stress, graphic design courses or even training on how to create your own broker. We will continue to advance in this area with the aim of generating sustainable knowledge.

Q As it is a huge net positive in helping organizations like yourselves, how do you look to have institutions help your charity?

All help is welcome and getting it on our own merits without having to resort to patronage speaks well of how we do things, although there is always space for improvement, of course. We are happy with the historic agreement that we signed last March with the largest university in Spain (UNED) and the Galician Federation of Municipalities and Provinces (FEGAMP) to provide training to political and technical personnel from 313 cities representing almost 3 million people on the SDGs and the 2030 Agenda. However,

our management model, regardless of the help of public administrations, is only sustainable with the support of our private Sponsors, whom we thank for their trust. In this sense, we have an annual program with great benefits for them. With it, we grant them an official certificate of corporate social responsibility, we provide them with a lot of visualization on our social networks, which helps them obtain contracts in their respective areas. They also obtain tax benefits and much more.

Q Are there also tax benefits to brands helping your charity?

As I mentioned in the previous point, of course, our partners get tax benefits, however, Powerful Reasons seeks loyalty and that is not only achieved with a profitable economic package. We periodically inform about the activities carried out to help the most

vulnerable groups and it matters a lot to us that the Sponsors feel that they have even contributed to saving lives. There is no money to pay for that.

Q Have you found that sponsoring a charity is a great tool for marketing a brand?

A company that today does not have a corporate social responsibility certificate is like a table that is missing a leg. In the year 2022, those who do not understand that should only travel and see with their own eyes the turn that the world is facing.

Q How can people get involved and contact you?

Through the email info@fuertes-razones.org or by visiting our website www.fuertes-razones.org from the contact form or the phone number that we make available to everyone.

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Game Changers Magazine

Lifestyle

Nina Prlja Let’s begin with my childhood well…

Two major facts made a deep impact on my childhood.

The premature death of my father and the 1999 bombardment of Serbia.

I am not stating that the war itself was hard for me since l was a young child.

In that age l couldn’t understand the depth of what was going on. I was seeing only fear in the eyes of people around me.

I spent my days with my best friend ,chasing around on the playground even though it wasn’t safe at all. We were climbing on the trees,running and making fun like every seven year old would do.

But when the siren’s were on,that awkward sound, everyone was running like crazy toward the first hideaway or cellars in the buildings.

We were as children afraid but having no clue why. Only seeing people crying and fainting while hearing the sirens for alert was a shock.

The bright side of my early childhood was my grandmother.

As my father died in that period when l was a small child,my mother had to devote her entire energy and attention toward my younger brother. He was a toddler at that time. The decision was made that l should stay with my grandmother .

Somehow it was a rather carefree period in my life since we were in the cottage of my grandmother during summer time.

I remember that l had one so-called friend there . She didn’t like me so much,I don’t know why obviously she couldn’t follow my energy …but my granny was everything to me . She was indeed my best and forever friend.

Even though we lived in a very modest manner ,she managed to have everything that we needed.

The greatest thing as l remember is that she was always keeping me busy ,learning about everything in the house ,in the cottage,in the yard …

When the time came for me to start the preschool,l stayed there for a short amount of time. Not because l didn’t like it…simply the kids were bullying me.

I felt rejected and not welcomed at all.

They were looking at me like l was an alien or something.. like there was no room for me to be a part of their fun and games.

In order to overcome and survive the bullying,l was making so many things,childish things in the kindergarten only to be heard and that my grandmother would come to pick me up as soon as possible to go home. I was fleeing every time from the kindergarten to escape the naughty kids.

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If l can explain my early adult life in a few words it would be like - l have to do something to change in my life whatever it takes and no matter what. I felt like nothing had a meaning in my life. I lived alone,couldn’t work in my job which l had at that time, I simply couldn’t take it anymore. Everything was making me sick.

I had a friend who was calling me repeatedly to come to Dubai. And l thought deeply about what to do…I said to myself - why not!

I packed my things and left Belgrade, my plan was to stay in Dubai only for 15 days. My idea was to reconnect with my thoughts and ideas about my future and to see what life had in store for me.

Dubai was a great idea, where I found I could heal myself.

As I came to Dubai primarily for my friend who called me as his guest, and was just an acquaintance . I had no idea nor clue in my wildest dreams that he had other intentions about my arrival to Dubai. It was a breathtaking moment for me as l sensed the vibration of the city. It was iconic…

Sweet scent in the air of flowers ,light breeze caressing my skin and the view over the skyscrapers was just like a movie scene. I couldn’t believe my own eyes when l really got the chance to see Burj Khalifa ,the highest building in the world! I’ve pinched myself to check whether it’s real…

The first evening when l got to Dubai, we went for dinner and then on to a Club. He treated me as a queen. He was a well mannered ,a perfectly settled young man where everything was in the right order. I had no remarks and l haven’t noticed any negative traits ,actually it was actually surprising to reveal that he is behaving so elegantly,smoothly at every occasion.

Well it was a blast for me. Anyhow,the moment came so we kissed each other and it worked out .

He lived in a hotel which was an absolutely hectic situation. People were present in his life and passing by his flat. I thought l have seen it all but.. this was far crazier. I liked that dynamic fun and craziness. We bonded somehow ,l felt that this is it,l am starting to be in love .

We would party every evening,Clubbing, dining and spending time at the beach. The sand was like the finest silky powder,the sea calm which was so inviting just to dive in.

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We would go very often spend the weekend in the desert in the desert, which was such an intensive feeling.The sleep over while watching the night sky and stars,driving specificly made SUV’s for sand dunes. Everything was so perfect . Life in Dubai was for me was like a rebirth. It was the place to be . And l was thankful that it existed.

Like in a fairy tale,my life changed.. we became like one. I thought this was love..

He offered me to stay with him and to move to Dubai .While we were as l thought in a perfect picture of love, l had not recognized that something strange was on going.

Our relationship had a strong bond and l had no need nor him to push the limits or to change something. We were really just fine. Nice and easy going.. As l look back,this is how l imagined it was…

In a blink of an eye everything changed.. l noticed that there were frequent guests coming to Dubai. Girlfriends of mine with no prior explanation. I was asking myself why they are coming so often. He started to behave oddly. I was suspicious, but nothing that l could point out what or who was the trigger of those changes. He became distant and cold toward me and extremely nervous,acting like a ghost. l was 24 years old at that time,l was still very childish so l was playing the game that he is cheating on me and I started to go out every evening with my friends. I wanted to get even by clubbing and partying, it was the only that mattered back then. We were uncontrollably hurting each other with this behavior, and our relationship became a nightmare.

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Whenever l had the need to ask him what’s going on,or how is he doing.

He would briefly answer that he is working for a Petrol trade company and that he has a lot on his mind.I never got the urge to ask too much, l trusted him.

I remember that during that period l began to drink hard as I felt desperate and lost since we weren’t doing good in our relationship. I remember whenever l would asked him how is he doing ,is his job all right,he would answer anxiously that he is opening a new company and he has no time to talk. Every discussion ended like that.

No matter what was going on ,there were traces of love between us no doubt,we simply couldn’t be without each other. I was sure that our love no matter what was so strong that we could overcome every obstacle. But it wasn’t..which was proven later on.

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Despite everything l never encountered or even imagined that he was involved with illicit substances! I am the one who was attending so many parties,events,clubs without him. Simply l could never ever bound by the idea with him that he is who he is. He wasn’t even drinking alcohol !

Many of his friends were top notch guys having their established businesses and great job positions that it never occurred to me at all that something could be wrong.

Sometimes he would have his “disappearing” moments,going under the radar for few days where we had no contact at all, and l was always thinking that it is my fault ,l have done something wrong. Very often l thought that he was having a love affair. His answer was very simplebusiness was the sole answer.

Even if l wanted to find any proof of his cheating or illegal matters, l couldn’t.

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Going back to the moment when we were arrested, seeing and hearing at 3 am on the doorstep of my apartment in Belgrade the special operation officers fully equipped. l have to admit that it wasn’t a pretty feeling, I was in shock and had no clue what was going on.

Earlier that evening ,l went to sleep incredibly tired . Suddenly a strong knocking on the door woke me up. The special operation unit wearing black masks over their heads bursted in my flat shouting and screaming at me to pack myself off immediately.

Asking them what to do, they said I should pack. It was incredibly cold and I was shocked and shivering. l managed to take medication to calm myself down so my memory is a bit blurred about the incident. I can vaguely remember what was going on.I woke up in the prison and l felt nothing except fear, loneliness and deception... I felt empty.

The Court wanted to grant the punishment of ten years for organizing ,placing for sale and production of illicit substances in Dubai. My state of shock and hopeless feeling was so deep and impacted . I was in the cell with young women and haven’t talked at all. I was speechless. Can you imagine what can happen only in one day? Crazy uh?

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I couldn’t see nor imagine my way out from this awful situation.

Staring at the locked door with no key wasn’t giving me any hope. But that’s not the end..

Another shock which emerged was when the female commander,gave me a bunch of newspapers which you could classify as the daily ,trashy types. My pictures were displayed everywhere on the front pages like a criminal chased around.

The headlines were horrible … Each time reading them l felt like swords were cutting my heart.

I had only one thing on my mind at that moment and it was what would my family think, and where will this madness lead to my reputation going down the drain. I had a feeling of total emptiness and disappointment was when l realized that all so called friends whom l was paying and buying everything in Dubai were completely forgetting my existence. They literally gave up on me, first through the media and then shockingly personally over the phone. The very same people whom were my guests in Dubai and I never asked for a penny from, all turned their backs on me.

I knew that l wasn’t guilty for sure. Only my mother and some rare friends from my area were there for me. The very same people that l unfortunately forgot in some fraction of life about when l left for Dubai the first time. Life can play odd tricks . It’s unexplainable.

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Thinking back it was absolutely unimaginable what was happening to me.

I was in a daydreaming state. The investigation was ongoing and l couldn’t see the end of it. The lawyer was telling me continuously that everything will be ok and finished soon. I wasn’t convicted but under investigation.

Every Monday was a torture for me to hear during seven months that l go out!

Within that period of seven months l had no information whether I will really will go free or l will be in prison for 10 years. I was just sitting there ,feeling dirty,rotten and waiting. The uncertainty was killing me every passing day.

I couldn’t eat nor sleep. The days were endless. Even if l could take a nap, l would have dreams about Dubai or the arrest in my flat. I felt like it was the end of my life...and then I decided that I would write a book about my experience whilst I am in prison.

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I have to outline the heavy pressure which was placed on me from the moment of the arrest. In the first moment they put me in a kind of an office and like 9 or 10 police officers,kind of inspectors were interrogating me repeatedly the same things..on and on. I went crazy!

I was answering the same words and by doing so l couldn’t follow my thoughts anymore. I had no clue what they were asking me. In the end it was like they were talking to someone else. The worst case scenario ever was that they had to bring in the unit for organized crime. I was sedated at that moment like l already mentioned when everything happened that night, l took the entire bottle of antidepressants. I couldn’t see clearly nor hear correctly. It was like I was in the tumble dry machine. It wasn’t normal as far as l knew to bring me in for interrogation in that unit instead of the prison, since the organized crime unit is for extremely dangerous criminals.

The police officers were interrogating and investigating literally every blink of my eyes. Every movement which l was making they were screening. Then they started to show me some pictures .

It was me in all of them. They photographed me everywhere ,clubs ,restaurants…everywhere!

Since my boyfriend opened the company for export-import of vegetables,the police officers were interrogating me for each and every employee in that company. Can you imagine the pressure of every policeman asking the

same questions one after the other in the same circle.

Doing so ,they were probably trying to force me to admit something, to say what l know. What l should say since l was very blunt ,I had no clue who is who,who was doing what. How can l admit something that l don’t know??

I started to lose my mind.

The tension was running high among all of us in that office since they had no tools to extract from me the information they wanted, and l had to admit to something that l had no clue about any of the alleged crimes.

It took them seven hours to get to nowhere. I was definitely torn out.

They decided to lock me up under the indictment of being the organizer of the criminal group which is producing and smuggling narcotics in Dubai.

While they were leading me towards the cell,l was reading the indictment.

I couldn’t believe my own eyes that l am seeing my name on the indictment.

The only picture which l had in my mind at that very moment was my family…

And we were just starting to get closer after so many years of separation from each other.

This agony was tearing me apart. Every two or three days my lawyer would say to me, “don’t worry you will soon be out of here” and the Court was sending another message - “you will be here for ten years” . And this was like that through seven harsh and crazy months. l didn’t know whom to listen and what to trust in.

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GAME CHANGERS Issue #39

Lessons learned - Oooh so absolutely true! I was extremely unkind in the past since I was a teenager. l was harsh towards some people and striving for material things. Money was no object for me. I wasn’t appreciating the time and energy of others,l was reckless for almost every issue. I mean l wasn’t grateful at all.

Actually l didn’t know what was the real meaning of gratefulness. It was like that till the moment l ended up eating from the trashy old plastic bowl in the prison,having a 30-40 years old blanket with holes made from the cigarettes from prior cell mates. And the smell of it….my God! I didnt even have a hair dryer so the air draft was playing a major role in the drying process of my hair..hahhahaha!

I had a special way of sleeping.l would have my hoody covering my head and slept on the window like a bird on a wire . And then one day out of the blue l received one book from a cell mate about Gratefulness. In that moment l realized why l was there,why the prison,why all of this happened.

The response was simple actually: l wasn’t grateful to no one. Never satisfied. That moment of truth raped my heart. I saw myself for the first time how much l was going wrong through life. The weeks and month’s were passing by, l matured in a very distinguished way and was honest to myself how stupid l was . In those four walls,the tiny box as the cell can be, the only thing which is left is YOU. Yourself. It was awful that l realized the meaning of my life . There was a light at the end .. and it was an essential thing .. it wasn’t too late.. at all! My message is my understanding and belief that l had learned my lesson unfortunately the hardest way. But it was worth it. The cost was to learn about myself, who I am and what l want in my life and my future. With whom to be and how to be. To nurture a sense for gratefulness and to be in the now in order to have a bright future. This is me and I am happy to be myself.

I had only one thought in my head at that very moment. Simply as it is, l am here ,right now and that there is no other option. I have to admit that l had low psychological moments

which is inevitable. But my gateway,my healing was to write down everything.

Sport and training was precious to me. With no physical engagement,my energy and thoughts would crumble me down. I was meticulous and trained two times per day. As for the newspapers l just stopped reading them and obliged people around me not to bring me anymore.

The trashy headlines were only tearing me apart.

The prison is a very specific environment, especially a women’s prison. You never know what can happen,what can arise from the bottom of the souls of some of them. Hate,fear and jealousy for small things can explode every second. You have to have your full attention and be on the alert in order to survive. That’s the reason why l wasn’t taking any medications only to be safe and sound ,having a clear mind. When the night comes it was a dark box with no possibility to have any help God forbid and let me tell you .. nasty things are going on there. Young girls were horrified and l had simply to survive.

Very often l would hear screaming and yelling in the night. Even though it sounds harsh l got used to those creepy sounds.My pill for feeling good was to meditate. That was my psychological freedom. No one believed that l could manage to ease myself and concentrate in order to reach the purest meditation. I got the message why the universe,why life was bringing me over there to be in the prison and having these women around me.

This punishment was actually the lesson of who l am. This was worth it. I am a fighter ,a survivor . The injustice which was placed on my shoulders and my name was nothing else than the justification that l must move on and express myself what l am made of.

As l am writing this text and smiling over my cup of tea from my terrace, l am watching the perfect sunset in Dubai. My life is here. Everything that l ever wished and dreamed - i achieved.

Life no matter what is good.

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GC:EAT NAMMOS – DUBAI Game Changers was incredibly fortunate to get the chance to spend the birthday celebration of Constantinos Aristophanous along with his fantastic colleagues at Exclusive Capital at the world-famous restaurant Nammos, on our recent visit to the iFX Expo in Dubai.

As it is not every day that you get invited to such an establishment, we were only too happy to oblige in sampling the food and finding out what all the buzz is about. Is it hype or is it the real deal?

In case you are not aware Nammos is perhaps one of the most exclusive places to eat in Dubai, and after an eventful day including a taxi journey not only taking us the wrong direction, but to a different country.

Myself and my Breinrock amiga Iva were only too happy to eat, drink and be merry.

I have always been one of those people that thought that food can only reach a certain level of excellence

and then it just tapers off into a place where people go to be included it in their latest Instagram picture. How many ways can there be to cook a steak?

I can categorically say that this perhaps one of the finest meals and environments that I have ever eaten in. Nammos pulled together not only incredibly attentive waiting staff, food which was just amazing, but also the live music was of such a good sound level and quality I thought it was not even live!

Previously I have always been reluctant to visit a restaurant advertises live music, as I have found it can often be no more than karaoke by someone who is often also battling some form of psychological problem, using the power of song to exercise their inner demons. In this case the music was fantastic!

I am not sure who they were, but I guess they were someone famous with the number of pictures being taken and excitement from my fellow patrons. Being a

little tipsy at this point it did lead me to think of abstract thoughts about what is fame if a nobody recognizes you…I blame it on the wine.

With regards to the food, it came in many different dishes from halloumi, truffles and the main course of a huge tomahawk steak that went from well done at the top to rare at the bottom. The wine was extraordinary, and one of the upsides of fantastic service was that my glass was never empty despite my best efforts.

If you want a table, apparently there is a six-week waiting list so plan well in advance of your trip. It seems impossible to just walk up and get a table if you are not a head of state or of similar ilk.

Thanks Victor, Lambros and Exclusive Capital for an unforgettable night and xronia polla Constaninos!

GC: FEMME CHRISTIAN DIOR

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GAME CHANGERS Issue #39

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BRAND: BURBERRY NAME: Location Motif Vintage Check Cashmere Scarf COST: 790 GBP

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BRAND: DIOR NAME: Short Sleeved Jacket COST: 2.400 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: CD Navy Earings COST: 420 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Dior Miniskirt COST: 1.200 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Dior Parisienne Bag COST: 4.000 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Dior Signiture 2SU COST: 390 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Dior Genesis Ankle Boot COST: 890 EUR

GC: HOMME CHRISTIAN DIOR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Atelier Baseball Blouson COST: 2.200 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Atelier Signet Ring COST: 290 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Atelier T-shirt relaxed fit COST: 890 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: B30 Sneaker COST: 890 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Short sleeved short with bandana motif COST: 1.650 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Bermuda shorts bandana motif COST: 1.500 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: CD Diamond chain link bracelet.

COST: 590 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Gemstone edition COST: 950 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: B27 Low top sneaker COST: 990 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Dior Kenny and Scharf Cardigan COST: 2.700 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Dior Kenny and Scharf Shirt COST: 1.200 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Dior Kenny and Scharf Bermuda Shorts COST: 1.100 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Dior Kenny and Scharf Vertical Pouch COST: 2.100 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: B27 Dior Kenny and Scharf Low Top Sneaker COST: 1.100 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Sweater with oblique inserts COST: 1.000 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Safari Messenger Bag COST: 1.600 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: CD Icon Chain Link Ring COST: 390 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: Diortag SU COST: 350 EUR

BRAND: DIOR NAME: B233 High Top Sneaker COST: 930 EUR

GC:FITNESS LUIS RIBEIRO Founder of Club Health www.clubhealth.uk

The Answer To 2022: Physiotherapy.

Do you know what it takes to make, or break a habit?

Let us be honest, the answer is not as simple as “21 days”. It’s about having a plan and being disciplined!

In just a few days everyone’s social media feeds will be flooding with new year’s resolutions, goals and motivational messages around fitness, lifestyle and wellness. Unfortunately, as we all know, most of them will fade by February 1st.

The ones that won’t fail are the ones that are based on a plan, broken down into tangible steps. That’s why in this article we want to dive into why a visit to your Physio is that tangible first step to turn your new year’s aspirations into reality. Keep reading!

BODY EVALUATION Let’s start with a vital question. How aware are you of your body’s state? We are not referring to the things that appear on the surface, like pain or discomfort, or the lack of an aesthetically pleasing six-pack.

We are talking about the things that cause what’s surfacing. Is your sore thumb caused by your Tinder swiping? Is your bunion the aftermath of your weak glutes? How about your low energy levels being one of the side effects of menopause or hormonal fluctuations? That’s what we’re referring to; being aware of what really needs your attention and what’s causing all the unwanted issues.

Every journey at Club Health begins exactly like that, by starting from within. Through thorough evaluation of the patient’s body and needs, our specialists identify what areas to focus on and how. In addition to the patient’s physical condition, our Team analyses the patient’s current mental state, lifestyle and availability to ensure that every aspect of their daily life is accounted for and is taken into consideration when forming a coherent plan to improve their body and mind.

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SETTING LIFE-CHANGING, ATTAINABLE GOALS The reason most NYR’s don’t make it past February is very simple. It comes down to being vague, or wishful even, and having no self-discipline. Everyone would love to work out 6 days a week, eat lean, meditate, do yoga in the morning and go to bed by 21:00… in theory! Truth is we are all different, so how on earth can our resolutions’ lists look pretty much the same?

Our aim during your first session at Club Health is to help you define your personal goals, that address all the points mentioned in the previous section and facilitate one purpose, getting you closer to the best version of yourself, utilising 100% of your potential.

What do we mean? Instead of your goals looking like a checklist from an online life coach, relevant to all and useful to none, we want your goals to look more like a solid action plan with specific stepping stones and timeframes.

Which leads us to the next point!

YOUR PLAN OF CARE (PoC) After identifying your needs and establishing your goals, we are missing one thing. The plan. This is where the Plan of Care comes in. At CH we create a personalised Plan of Care after every assessment, to ensure our patients follow a consistent program that will help them succeed on what they set out to achieve.

The Plan includes everything from what your rehabilitation training should look like, to what type of manipulative & manual therapy you’ll need, and even what supplements to take!

The PoC is the reason your NYR’s will make it well past February and give you long term, life-changing results.

PRIVATE SESSIONS & GUIDANCE It’s very easy to lose the plot when leading a busy lifestyle. Whether it’s your career, family or social life that’s taking up most of your time, your wellbeing should always take the front seat!

One-on-one sessions, supervision and personal contact are the ways to always be reminded of that and stay on track. Be it Physiotherapy, Clinical Pilates or Rehab & Conditioning sessions, all practitioners at CH make sure you are encouraged, hyped and focused both during your time at the Clinic and while you’re away.

SUPPORT & ADAPTATION What happens if your circumstances change, or you’ve reached your first stepping stone quicker than expected?

Adaptation.

Our Team holds weekly meetings to revise and update your PoC to ensure it is adapted to, and follows your latest life circumstances and needs. Even if that means switching to online supervised sessions for a while, replacing treatments, or making a new Plan altogether.

No matter the obstacle, our Team is with you every step of the way, treating your resolutions as their own… and that’s why visiting Club Health is the answer to seeing your NYR’s take shape in 2022, and your new lifestyle and habits carried into 2023.

“It’s the small habits that we do now, that lead to huge results in the future. These patterns added up over long periods of time can have a tremendous impact on who you are.” – Luis Ribeiro

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GC:GOING OUT ZUMA – DUBAI After a hectic week in Dubai culminating in the iFX expo, my fellow Фриендс оф Breinrock made our way to our private party at Zuma in Dubai to decompress after a couple of incredibly busy days. Having visited before for a more formal sit-down meal in the restaurant area, I was intrigued to see what the private section was like that we had booked on the upper floor.

For those who have not been fortunate enough to visit, Zuma is a high-end restaurant and I guess you could also call it a bar with excellent music. Not only did it have a great DJ playing, he was also accompanied by what seemed to be a full percussion section which matched the music incredibly well.

When we arrived, it was already rammed with the beautiful and affluent of Dubai, who were delicately eating sushi from high tables and dancing the night away. After a short wait we got our private seating area just away from the DJ. Luckily, we were close enough to still feel part of the general ambience of the place, but also have some space away from the crowds.

Being a man of a certain age now, I was incredibly happy to sit down after being stood up for a couple of days, it’s fair to say my dogs were barking and they needed a rest! We were incredibly fortunate to have a great server who seemed determined not to let me run out of ice-cold Japanese beer, something which

GAME CHANGERS Issue #39

was quite an achievement when I calculated the formula of my thirst and the amount of people, they had to take care of.

The menu has a huge selection of some of the highest quality Japanese food you will ever be fortunate enough to sit in front of and devour. It is not just the ten standard sushi and sashimi choices that you can find yourself choosing from, you are paying for quality that is not only reflected in the menu, but also, I have often found unmatched on any visit to other Japanese restaurants.

From my previous visits here, I can categorically state the food is always immaculately presented and incredibly delicious with so many flavor’s emanating from it.

With any Asian food, I personally believe that the presentation is almost as significant as the taste, something which Zuma absolutely excels in. I think you can always tell when you are in a great place, is when your anticipation meets your hunger.

After a couple of hours of drinking, having a lot of fun we wearily we made it to our cabs, where my unfortunate cab companions no doubt had the luxury of listening to my boozy musings on life and the universe.

If you are looking to visit, it is advisable to book a table probably prior to you landing in the country as competition is stiff to get a table, but it is something that you certainly will not regret.

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ISSUE #39

THE JOURNAL FOR INDUSTRY LEADERS

www.gchangersmag.com info@gchangersmag.com