9th India Wealth Management Conference | Mumbai

Bijal Ajinkya, a partner in the Direct Tax, Private Client, and Investment Funds practice groups in the Mumbai office, has over 24 years of experience. She specializes in international tax, inbound and outbound investment structuring, SPAC transactions, M&A tax negotiations, tax insurance, and complex tax issues like GAAR, POEM, and PE. Bijal has led many successful and groundbreaking tax litigations in India, offering unique litigation strategies and serving as an expert witness in international arbitration. She recently concluded a precedent-setting tax information exchange case involving the Channel Islands. Her notable international tax litigation work includes cases on the India-Mauritius Tax Treaty, Minimum Alternate Tax for Foreign Portfolio Investors, and taxation issues for companies like Morgan Stanley and Dun & Bradstreet. As a Private Client practitioner, Bijal advises on succession planning, asset protection, and cross-border inheritance tax, helping family businesses create frameworks for wealth and leadership succession. Bijal has pioneered tax structures for investment funds and has been recognized by IFA, India, for her contributions. She advises clients on fund formation, structuring, and has represented fund managers before tax authorities. Bijal is regularly featured in leading legal directories like Chambers & Partners, Legal 500, and Who’s Who Legal. She was ranked as a Leader Tax Champion by Legal Era and one of Asia’s Top 15 Female Lawyers by Asian Legal Business in 2021. Bijal is a serving Steering Committee Member of Private Client Exchange, Asia. She is the first Indian lawyer admitted as an international fellow to ACTEC and actively participates in consultations with the Indian Government on tax policies.

Dan Farley is executive vice president of State Street Global Advisors, and chief investment officer of the Investment Solutions Group. In this role, he oversees a team of over 75 investment professionals managing over US$180 billion in multi-asset class portfolios, including tactical asset allocation, liability driven investments and working with clients in developing customized investment portfolios to meet their specific objectives. He is also a member of our Executive Management Group. Prior to this role he was responsible for the US multi-asset class solutions team. Dan holds a Master of Business Administration from Bentley University, a Bachelor of Science in business administration from Stonehill College and has earned the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation. He is a member of the CFA Institute and the Boston Securities Analyst Society. He is on the State Street Foundation's Corporate Allocations Committee and executive sponsor of the firm's Latin American Professionals Group. Dan is a frequent speaker with the media and conferences on a variety of investment topics. He is also vice chairman of the Board at the Crispus Attucks Children's Center.

Mr. Hemendra Kothari represents the fourth generation of a family of prominent stock brokers. After serving the Stock Exchange, Mumbai, in the capacity of Vice President for three years, he was elected President in March 1991. He founded the company "DSP Financial Consultants Ltd." (DSP) in 1975 which has evolved into a full fledged financial services organisation with offices in all the major metros in the country. In 1995, DSP entered into a joint-venture with Merrill Lynch and the name was changed to DSP Merrill Lynch Limited. Mr. Kothari served as the Chairman of the Company till March 31, 2009. Mr. Kothari is also a member of several leading representative trade forums including Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI).

Nimesh Chandan is an Investment Professional with 22 years of experience in investing in the Indian capital markets. He has an established track record in managing money and advising clients, both Domestic and International, Retail as well as Institutional. Over the years, he has developed an investment process that generates alpha through informational, analytical as well as behavioural edge. He has been part of the mutual fund industry for 17 years where has managed products across market capitalisation and themes, and developed models on Sustainable Investing, Quant Investing and Asset Allocation. Nimesh is a keen follower of Behavioural Finance and has been writing and presenting on the role of psychology in Investment Decision-making to the investment community. He has developed a set of processes and tools that help reduce one’s behavioural mistakes and understand the crowd or market behaviour.

Satish Swamy, CFA is senior managing director at the University of California Investments office, which he joined in 1998. He is currently the Head of Asia, co-head of both Global Real Estate and Asset Allocation for the UC system’s $180 Billion portfolio, including oversight of global fixed income. His more than 30 years of investment industry experience have also included positions with Lincoln Financial Group and Analytic Investors. At UC Investments, Swamy is a member of the leadership team and investment committee. Additionally, Swamy holds a prestigious position as a faculty member in the finance department at the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley, where he teaches a highly sought-after elective in Finance for MBA students. Swamy received his B.E. in electronics engineering from Bangalore University, an M.S. in electrical and computer engineering from University of Houston, and an M.B.A. in finance from University of Southern California. He was a board member of the CFA society of San Francisco from 2004-2012 and served as society president in 2010-2011. He also served as the head of the San Francisco chapter of the Global Association of Risk Professionals (GARP) from 1996-2016. He has published in the Handbook of Derivative Instruments and was invited to speak at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta’s financial market conference in 2017.

Umang Papneja is CEO at Julius Baer India. A seasoned banker with a proven track record and profound knowledge of working in businesses of significant scale, size, and reputation. In his current role, Umang is responsible for driving the India growth strategy, focusing on building up a major presence locally. He is also responsible to steer the firm's local product and infrastructure innovation and develop a broader range of sophisticated and relevant products and services catered to the growing community of high-net-worth individuals in India. During his long tenured career, Umang has held several senior management positions in the finance and private banking and wealth management industry. In September 2009, he joined IIFL Wealth where he was instrumental in providing strategic guidance for investment decisions across asset classes including equities, real estate, fixed income, commodities, and alternatives with a focus on continuous product innovation. In September 2005, he joined Societe Generale Private Banking in Mumbai as Director & Head, Investment Advisory, India and successfully created investment products and ideas for domestic and NRI clients of the Global Indian Subcontinent. A post-graduate in Management Studies (Finance) from Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies, Umang has also completed an executive programme from Singularity University, US.

Dr. Vikram Srinivasan is the Founder of Needl.ai, a deep-tech AI company, that aims to build AI-assisted information workflows for the Financial Services industry.  He received his PhD from UC San Diego. He has straddled academia (NUS, IISc), research labs (Bell Labs), and entrepreneurship (Zettata, Needl.ai).  He loves to bring deep technology to bear on business problems to drive significant value.

Shreenivas Kunte leads the AI and content work at HDFC AMC. He codes in Python and has an avid interest in promoting AI and Machine Learning use in investment decision-making. Prior to joining HDFC AMC, Shreenivas was Director of Professional Learning and Advocacy at CFA Institute. Before that Shreenivas worked as the country trading strategist for Citi in Japan.  Shreenivas has worked for over two decades in the investment industry. He has worked closely with key stakeholders, both in Japan and in India's topmost institutions, including regulatory bodies. Shreenivas is a computer engineer and Ph.D. from IIT Bombay.

Shamit joined ICICI Prudential AMC in February 2016, and oversees ~USD 4.4billion of assets advised for international investors. 
He brings 17+ years of asset management experience across investing, manager selection, products, global asset raising, and strategy. He has set up and advised several India equity and FI funds across Asia (incl Japan) and Europe, selected international  manager strategies, and is also helping implement ESG frameworks at the firm. Previously he worked with Nippon Life India Asset Management in Mumbai and Nippon Life Insurance in Tokyo, with past experience across firms in New York, Boston, Tokyo and Mumbai. He holds a MBA from Boston College, M.Com and B.Com degrees from University of Mumbai. He is a CFA Charterholder,  Board Member and Chairperson for Professional Learning at the CFA Society India