FX Markets Europe

Ruth was appointed Chief Executive of the LBMA in January 2014. She is responsible for the success and strategic development of the LBMA, in partnership with the Chairman and the Board. She is also responsible for maintaining accountability to and the quality of, the Association's Membership and Good Delivery Refiners as well as representing the interests of the Association in relation to regulators, investors, media and international precious metals markets.

Before being appointed Chief Executive, she spent seven years working in the Association, initially as Commercial Director and then as Deputy Chief Executive, where she acted as the main lead on Governmental Affairs. She was also responsible for the Association's work on supply chain due diligence, with particular regard to the creation and implementation of the LBMA’s Responsible Gold Guidance. She has represented the Association at industry, governmental and multi-stakeholder regulatory forums. She continues to serve as Vice Chair of the OECD Multi-Stakeholder Governance Group for Responsible Minerals. As Commercial Director, she oversaw the development of the LBMA Conference, the LBMA's quarterly publication the Alchemist and the LBMA website.

Prior to joining the LBMA, she worked in bank finance and US corporate law at the law firms of White & Case and Norton Rose, and also acted as a monitor at the UN Commission on Human Rights in Geneva. She has an MSc in History of International Relations from the London School of Economics and a degree in English Literature from Kenyon College in Ohio.

Jean-Pierre Vidal is Head of the Policy and Strategy Division of the European Investment Bank. He was Counsellor to the Executive Board of the European Central Bank from September 2016 to June 2019.

Prior to this, Jean-Pierre was Chief Economic Advisor to the President of the European Council, Donald Tusk, and a member of the cabinet of the first President of the European Council, Herman Van Rompuy. He held several positions at the European Central Bank: Head of the ECB Representative Office in Brussels (2011-2012), Deputy Head of the Monetary Policy Strategy Division (2007-2011), and Head of the Fiscal Analysis Section (2004-2007).

Before joining the ECB as an economist in 2000, he worked as a senior researcher at the ‘Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique’ (CNRS). Jean-Pierre holds an MBA from ESSEC business school (‘Ecole Supérieure des Sciences Economiques et Commerciales’) and a Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge.

James Wood Collins joined Record Currency Management in August 2008 as a senior member of the Client Team and was appointed Chief Executive Officer in October 2010. James also currently chairs Record's Executive Committee and is a member of its Investment Committee.

He was previously at JP Morgan Cazenove, where he was a Managing Director advising financial institutions on M&A, IPOs and related corporate finance transactions, including the December 2007 IPO of Record plc.

Helen Thomas CFA has worked in financial markets for over 17 years. She founded her own macroeconomic consulting firm, BlondeMoney, in 2017. Her team works out of offices in Oxford and London, and provides expert analysis on financial markets and politics. Before that she was a Partner at a Global Macro hedge fund and Head of Currency Alpha for State Street Global Advisors. She started her career in Foreign Exchange at Merrill Lynch before going on to work for Societe Generale and SEB. She has also worked in politics, as an adviser to former Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne during the financial crisis.

She is a CFA Charterholder and holds a degree in probably the least practical combination of subjects: Philosophy, Politics and Economics which she gained from Oxford University.

She is a Board Member of CFA UK where she is responsible for their sub-committee on the Value of the Investment Profession.

She was lead researcher on the book "Masters of Nothing" by the MPs Matthew Hancock and Nadhim Zahawi, which looked at how human behaviour caused the financial crisis and how to avoid it happening again.