(From left) Prof. Dragon TANG (Area Head of Finance), Mr. Henry CHAN (CIO of BEA Union Investment Management Limited), Dr. AU King-lun (CEO of Value Partners Group), and Prof. Anna WONG (Professor of Practice in Finance)

The Financial Services Development Council (FSDC) and the Faculty of Business and Economics of the University of Hong Kong jointly hosted a forum on 21 March 2019 to offer university students the opportunity to learn more about the current landscape and future trends of the financial services sector.

The forum, titled ‘Navigating Your Career in Financial Services – in the Right Place at the Right Time’, featured two keynote speakers from leading asset management firms – Dr. AU King-lun, Chief Executive Officer of Value Partners Group and Mr. Henry CHAN, Chief Investment Officer of BEA Union Investment Management Limited. Dr. Au is also a board member of FSDC.

At the forum, the two speakers explained how financial technology and innovation have dramatically transformed the financial services landscape.

With over 30 years of industry experience in asset management, Dr. Au said that new technology has created numerous jobs in the financial services industry such as programmers and IT specialists. However, he added that there are also growing opportunities for other non-IT related graduates. ‘Many asset management firms are looking for investment writers who not only can write perfectly in English and Chinese but also tell compelling stories of their products’, Dr. Au said. He continued to explain why communicating complex investment ideas in a dynamic fashion is a crucial aspect of driving customer engagement. ‘As we are now in the era of information explosion, getting the right message across to our customers on social media has become very important.’

Mr. Chan, who specialises in managing Asian equities, shared his story about how he got into the industry. ‘I joined the industry in 1995. China was hot and everyone wanted to become a China or Asian fund manager’, he said. He first started his career as an analyst. He then later was introduced an opportunity to be a Taiwan fund manager. ‘At that time, Taiwan was tiny, even Indonesia had a bigger index rating than Taiwan. There was no technology sector and 70 per cent of the market was insurance companies and banks.’ Despite some voices of disapproval from his peers, he accepted the job offer and managed the Taiwan fund well. He remarked that Taiwan opened many doors for him. He said, ‘Had I not done Taiwan, I would never have had the chance to become a Greater China manager’. He advised students to always stay prepared and be in the right place all the time.

The Practitioner Speaker Series is an initiative developed by the FSDC and local universities that offers students the opportunity to hear from industry experts and professionals in the financial services sector about their experience, latest topics and trends, and job prospects in the field.

For the video recording of the forum, please click here.

The ‘IMBA 2.0 Enrichment Talk: Cross-cultural Business Strategy’ was held successfully on 13 April, 2019, where Mr. Baniel CHEUNG, Adjunct Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Business and Economics, and Mr. Eudes FABRE, CEO North Asia of Lagardère Travel Retail, who is also our alumnus of the EMBA Global Asia programme, shared their insights on cross-cultural marketing strategies, and the impact of culture on entrepreneurship.

Presenting the theoretical framework and cases of cross-cultural people management, Mr. Baniel Cheung emphasised the importance of ‘effective team mix’ and how it affects the entire communications and marketing strategies of an organisation. Mr. Eudes Fabre gave a talk on ‘Creating competitive cross-cultural business and marketing strategies’, and shared how he managed to bring the foreign brand Lagardère to the Chinese market. Mr. Fabre mentioned the biggest challenge to operate a company in a foreign market was to keep the unique cultures of the brand while develop a different business model to meet the local needs.

The enrichment talk ended with a Q&A session, where participants and the speakers had engaging exchanges.

Mr. Baniel Cheung and Mr. Eudes Fabre shared their market insights with the audience.

Jointly organised by HKU Faculty of Business and Economics, Asian Institute of International Financial Law, Faculty of Law, and HKU Law Innovation Technology and Entrepreneurship Programme, the conference “HKU FinTech Conference: Market Developments and Regulations” was successfully held on 24 May 2019 in the campus. Over 80 participants from academia and industry attended the event.

Professor Dragon Tang, Area Head in Finance, welcomed all the participants to the conference and introduced the keynote speaker Professor John Griffin. Titled “Is Bitcoin Really Un-Tethered?”, Professor Griffin talked about how Tether is used to affect Bitcoin prices. Both academics and practitioners had a very engaging session with Professor Griffin, raising many questions and feedback on the Bitcoin market and its regulations and standards.

Five papers were then presented, after the keynote session, by scholars from all over the world. They are Professor Xiaoyan Zhang from Tsinghua University, Professor Lin Peng from Baruch College of City University of New York, Professor Roger Loh from Singapore Management University, Professor Yi Huang from Graduate Institute Geneva, and Professor Alex Yang from London Business School and The University of Hong Kong. These speakers presented a wide range of topics on the area of FinTech, such as peer-to-peer lending, real effects of FinTech, and framework of cryptocurrencies. Their papers were commented by discussants – Haitian Lu from The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Vikas Agarwal from Georgia State University, Johan Sulaeman from National University of Singapore, Jinfan Zhang from The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen, and Bin Wei from Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, as well as the audience. The two sessions were chaired by Professor Tse-Chun Lin from HKU Faculty of Business and Economics, and Dr. Ilhyock Shim, Head of Economics and Financial Markets for Asia and the Pacific of Bank for International Settlements.

Mr. Eugene Huang, Chief Operating Officer and Chief Technology Officer of OneConnect (the main FinTech platform of Ping An Group), then gave a highly impressive speech on Ping An’s FinTech system in the plenary session. Mr. Huang has shared how Ping An integrates all aspects of FinTech and how people’s daily life is impacted in a positive way. He also explained how Ping An is entering other markets replicating the success in China.

The conference was ended with a panel discussion moderated by Mr. Brian Tang from Asia Capital Market Institute. Five panelists with different FinTech practices talked about their ongoing work and projects, and debated on the regulatory framework on FinTech.

Overall, the conference has successfully addressed timely and important issues on FinTech related areas, and facilitated a fruitful knowledge exchange between academics and practitioners. For more information please visit the conference website https://www.hkubs.hku.hk/conference/ftc-mdr/index.html.

Aiming to empower business leaders from Chinese mainland by instilling innovative business ideas, impactful business strategies and global mindset, and to reinforce their competitiveness in the global arena, Executive Education of the Faculty of Business and Economics has successfully launched the ‘Business Leader Programme’.

This comprehensive programme consists of five core modules and one overseas module. Each core module focuses on different angles of global market, to equip participants with cutting-edge knowledge of macro-economics and politics, finance, management, creative thinking and frontier technology.

Dean Hongbin CAI expressed his warm welcome to the first batch of programme participants in the Opening Ceremony held on 24 April, 2019 and highlighted the importance of lifelong learning. Professor Haipeng SHEN, Associate Dean (Executive Education), commented that executive training is essential and HKU would be a great place to develop knowledge of global and China perspectives. At the Gala Dinner held in the evening, Ms. Winnie LAI, Deputy Director of China Affairs of HKU, gave her opening speech and congratulated the commencement of the Business Leader Programme.

The theme of the first module is ‘From the World to China’, emphasising the uniqueness and importance of China business in the international economic stage. Professor Zhiwu CHEN and Professor Geng XIAO from the Faculty of Business and Economics and Professor Guoqi XU from the Department of History, came to the class and shared their insights on topics of global finance, international relations, economic development of the Greater Bay Area, and history of internationalisation of China.

Dean Hongbin Cai and Associate Dean Haipeng Shen at the Opening Ceremony.

Ms. Winnie Lai, Deputy Director of China Affairs of HKU, at the Gala Dinner.

Professor Zhiwu Chen and Professor Geng Xiao in class.

Professor Guoqi Xu in class.

The 12^th Inauguration of Endowed Professorships was held last night at Loke Yew Hall of The University of Hong Kong (HKU). Three Faculty members are appointed Endowed Professorships. They are:

Professor Haipeng SHEN
Patrick S C Poon Professorship in Analytics and Innovation

Professor James KUNG
Sein and Isaac Souede Professorship in Economic History

Professor Simon LAM
Ian Davies Professorship in Ethics

An “Endowed Professorship” is one of the most significant awards bestowed upon eminent academics within the University in support of their academic and research activities. A total of 116 Endowed Professorships have been established at HKU since 2005.

For more information about Endowed Professorship, please click here.

Photo(s) provided by the Development & Alumni Affairs Office

Gender-balanced boards are proven to result in greater business success. The Executive Education of the Faculty of Business and Economics has launched the eight-session Women’s Directorship Programme to answer the call from the worldwide business community tackling the existing gender diversity imbalance in boardrooms. The first session of the Women’s Directorship Programme has taken place from 23 to 25 May 2019.  We welcomed a cohort of inspirational women across the globe, representing a range of industries and functional expertise, and prepared them to be ready for responsibilities in the boardrooms.

Mr. David Lee, Senior Lecturer of the Faculty of Business and Economics, who led the first two modules of the programme, has set the pace for the participants. In the programme, the first module has covered Roles and Responsibilities of Board Members, with topics such as the wisdom of the crowd, diversity of thoughts, corporate governance, transformational learning and purpose, and etc. The second module covered Strategic Leadership at the board, and discussed the topics of covering, reframing and decision making.  While the third module was led by Ms. Lindsey Coen-Fernandez, Adjunct Assistant Professor, focused on Persuasive Communication and Conflict Management. A board simulation was brought into class to allow participants practice their skills.

With the strong support from many senior business leaders, the programme has also invited many guest speakers to share their experience with participants, and to bring knowledge into life. This session was joined by Jean Pascal Tricoire, CEO and Chairman of Schneider Electric, Chia Ko, Director of Grace Financial, and Johan Bygge, Senior Advisor to EQT Asia and Rick Haythornthwaite, and Chairman of Mastercard and Centrica.

The second session of the Women’s Directorship Programme 2019 is going to resume in September. For more information please visit: www.wdpinternational.com.

Two representatives from European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), Mr. Alexander Plekhanov, Director for Transition Impact and Global Economics, EBRD Office of the Chief Economist and Mr. Richard Jones, AIIB-EBRD Business Development Director, visited HKU on 8 March 2019 and delivered a Knowledge Exchange (KE) Lecture on their 2018-19 Transition Report titled Work in Transition.

During the lecture, Mr. Plekhanov and Mr. Jones shared some interesting findings of the report, e.g. life-long learning programmes are needed to cope with an ageing workforce, as their average skill scores over the working life continue to decline after 30 years old. They also discussed with the audience how governments should respond to urbanisation, an ageing workforce or rising numbers of young people entering the labour market.

Full report can be found here.

Congratulations to WONG Ka Ki Eunice, BBA(Law)&LLB, Year 4, taking home the Second Prize in the EY’s Young Tax Professional of the Year 2019 (National Competition). The competition was successfully held on 30 March in Shanghai, and gathered top winners from other cities in the Greater China. Eunice has previously outperformed over 100 participants from different local universities, and won the First Prize and My Most Favourite Presenter Award in the Local Competition. This is the third consecutive year for FBE students to seize the championship in the local competition. Dr. Christina Ng, Principal Lecturer, is the faculty advisor of the competition.

Going through the two major rounds in Hong Kong and Shanghai, Eunice felt honoured to be part of the competition, “It has definitely aroused my great interest for Hong Kong and international tax. One thing that taxation fascinates me most is that there are no right or wrong answers in most of the cases. The tax planners have to work around the issues with critical and creative thinking, given that the general standards are complied with.”

“The most challenging part of the competition is to learn the taxation systems of China and other countries when preparing for the national round. The differences in the types of tax charged and the double taxation agreements between jurisdictions make tax planning way more sophisticated than I thought before.”

Eunice also said that the competition was a great opportunity for her to enhance the technical knowledge and to meet talents from other regions, “The expereince and connection made are definitely valuable to my future career development. I would encourage my cohorts to join this programme in the future”.

During the final competition, participants were given a case study to express their views in group debate. Shortlisted finalists then did an individual presentation to a panel of judges, showing their technical skills and competenecies in tax technical, reasoning, presentation and communication.

Established in 2010, the EY’s Young Tax Professional of the Year is an international competition designed to identify young talent with an interest in tax, help them enhance their professional skills and develop their careers. The competition gives participants the opportunity to share experiences with people from a range of backgrounds and cultures, and exposes them to the skills required to be tomorrow’s tax leaders.

Dr. Christina Ng (first from left) is the faculty advisor of the competition.