• The initial cohort of speakers includes senior leaders from global banking institutions such as UBS, State Street, BNY, Santander, Standard Chartered, First Abu Dhabi Bank, Emirates NBD, Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank, Starling Bank and OakNorth Bank.
• The lineup includes the CEOs, Founders and Chairs of global investment power houses such as Bridgewater, Nuveen, Vista Equity Partners, General Atlantic, PGIM, GQG, Hillhouse, Investcorp, Prosus, Brookfield, AXA IM, Alterra, Brevan Howard, Two Sigma and Marshall Wace.

ABU DHABI, UAE, Sept. 24, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — Abu Dhabi Finance Week (ADFW), hosted by ADGM, has announced that its 2024 edition will gather more than 300 speakers from across the globe, including the CEOs and Chairs of 50 global financial institutions.

Among the confirmed speakers are finance titans such as Sergio Ermotti – Group CEO of UBS, Bill Huffman – CEO of Nuveen, David Hunt – President & CEO of PGIM, Isabelle Scemama – Global Head of AXA IM, Bill Ford – Chairman & CEO of General Atlantic, Shayne Nelson – Group CEO of Emirates NBD, Ray Dalio – Founder of Bridgewater, Rajiv Jain – Chairman and CIO of GQG Partners, Mohammed Alaradhi – Executive Chairman of Investcorp, His Excellency Ambassador Majid AlSuwaidi – CEO of Alterra, Jeremy Allaire –Co Founder, Chairman and CEO of Circle and Mohamed Abdelbary – CEO of ADIB.

His Excellency Ahmed Jasim Al Zaabi, Chairman of ADGM, said: “As Abu Dhabi continues to solidify its position as a global financial powerhouse, ADFW 2024 will be a pivotal moment for the financial industry. The rapidly increasing participation of CEOs from globally significant financial institutions, underscores ADFW’s rising prominence and influence as a leading platform. At ADGM, we are committed to driving meaningful dialogue, fostering innovation, and reinforcing Abu Dhabi’s role as the Capital of Capital.”

Local and regional government and government-affiliated leaders will also take centre stage at this year’s ADFW with prominent names such as Her Highness Sheikha Shamma bint Sultan Bin Khalifa Al Nahyan – President & CEO of the UAE Independent Climate Change Accelerators (UICCA), H.R.H. Prince Khaled bin Alwaleed bin Talal Al Saud – Founder and CEO of KBW Ventures, H.E. Abdulla Bin Touq AlMarri – Minister of Economy of the UAE, H.E. Dr. Thani bin Ahmed Al Zeyoudi – Minister of State for Foreign Trade and Minister in charge of Talent Attraction and Retention at Ministry Of Economy of the UAE, H.E. Dr. Amna bint Abdullah Al Dahak – Minister of Climate Change & Environment of the UAE, H.E. Mohammed Ali Al Shorafa Al Hammadi –Chairman of the Department of Municipalities and Transport (DMT).

In addition to Robert Salomon – Dean of Stern at NYUAD, Chi-Man Kwan – Group CEO and Founder of Raffles Family Office, Kim Fournais – CEO, Saxo Bank, Christian Angermeyer – Founder, Aperion Investments, Hatem Dowidar – Group CEO of E&, , Rishi Khosla – Co-Founder & CEO of Oaknorth, Javier Carranza – Global Head of Wealth of Grupo Santander, Shamsir Vayalil – Founder and Non-Executive Chairman & CEO of Burjeel Holdings and Andrew Sullivan – EVP & Head of International Businesses of Prudential.

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With Citrea Testnet, Bitcoin starts to scale its original goal: self-sovereign finance.

GEORGE TOWN, Cayman Islands, Sept. 24, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — Today, Citrea announces the launch of Citrea Testnet on Bitcoin Testnet4. Citrea Testnet marks a significant step towards using Bitcoin as a settlement layer, setting the stage for a decentralized, self-sovereign financial ecosystem on a global scale. Bitcoin is now one step closer to its next phase, the foundation for the world’s finance. 

Citrea Testnet introduces a new Bitcoin era for both developers and users, where accessing Bitcoin’s utility doesn’t come at the expense of sacrificing its self-sovereignty. Citrea Testnet is the only working rollup solution allowing EVM developers to build decentralized applications that inherit Bitcoin’s security while leveraging the most trust-minimized way to use BTC.

What is in Citrea Testnet? 

Citrea Testnet includes a nearly complete version of Clementine — Citrea’s BitVM-based trust-minimized bridge design — and puts critical bridge infrastructure to the test, such as detecting malicious operators, coordinating pre-signatures, and operator-based withdrawals. The final piece, implementing fraud proofs with BitVM, is underway as the team continues to contribute to the open-source BitVM repository. 

Building An Economy On Bitcoin

With Citrea Testnet, Bitcoin can finally start to scale its original goal, self-sovereign finance. Citrea Testnet provides developers with a novel platform to build powerful applications that will achieve both financial inclusion and freedom for new and existing Bitcoin users. By using Bitcoin for both settlement and data availability, Citrea increases BTC’s utility and activates Bitcoin blockspace for a new financial ecosystem.

Key Citrea Features: 

• Fully EVM Compatible: Citrea’s execution environment supports all EVM tooling and languages, allowing developers to easily deploy smart contracts on a Bitcoin secured platform. 
• Bitcoin Settlement: Once Citrea’s trust-minimized BitVM-based bridge, Clementine, is fully implemented, developers can leverage trust-minimized BTC in their applications.
• Access to Bitcoin Blockspace: Citrea opens the most secure blockpace to developers, enabling them to build applications and create an economy secured by Bitcoin. 

Developers who want to build on Citrea can get directly in touch with the team via Citrea’s developer form.

Citrea plans to ship Mainnet in Q1 2025.

About Citrea

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Citrea is the first rollup that increases BTC’s utility and activates Bitcoin blockspace for a new financial ecosystem. Citrea’s vision is to build scalable infrastructure that advances Bitcoin into its next phase, the foundation for the world’s finance. Achieving this vision requires scaling Bitcoin blockspace to increase its transaction capacity and expressivity without changing its consensus rules.

If you want to build on Citrea, please fill out Citrea developer form: https://citrea.typeform.com/incubation 
For more information, please visit: https://citrea.xyz/

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SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 24, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — Flutterwave, Africa’s leading payments technology company, today announced the expansion of its Send App service across 49 U.S. states through a partnership with MainStreet Bank, a subsidiary of MainStreet Bancshares Inc. Send App by Flutterwave facilitates faster, easier, and more affordable money transfers from Africans in the diaspora to their families and friends back home. Other key features of Send App include real-time support and exchange rate updates, an activity section that tracks transactions in real-time, and a new voucher and referral code section.

Remittances to Africa have doubled over the last decade, reaching an estimated $100 billion in 2022, according to the United Nations, supporting the medical bills, education costs, and living expenses of an estimated 200 million Africans. The importance and necessity of staying connected, no matter the distance, is a key driver of this expansion.

Since its initial launch, Send App has quickly established itself as a trusted platform for Africans in the diaspora, offering a simple and affordable way to send money to loved ones across Africa. Send App’s U.S. coverage has grown to 49 states today (all except Texas). The U.S. expansion will build on Flutterwave’s success and reinforce its commitment to serving African diaspora communities globally with a payment solution that fits their needs.

“As a customer-focused, tech-forward community bank, MainStreet Bank understands and prioritizes investment in communities, which makes it a great fit for Flutterwave’s goal to build bridges that connect Africa to the world,” said Olugbenga “GB” Agboola, Founder and CEO of Flutterwave.

“Our partnership with MainStreet Bank underscores our dedication to providing secure, regulatory compliant, and efficient financial solutions. This has further strengthened the safety and security of our customers’ funds and data, ensuring that Send App remains a reliable remittance solution that gives Africans in the diaspora peace of mind with every dollar they send back home. We care deeply about our diaspora community, who we expect to play a major role in Africa’s next phase of growth.”

Todd Youngren, President of Avenu, a Division of MainStreet Bank, said the Flutterwave relationship is a great fit for Avenu, an embedded banking platform with fully integrated compliance and risk management: “We are proud to partner with Flutterwave as they expand Send App across the U.S.”

Send App by Flutterwave is currently available on Google Play Store and Apple App Store. For more information on how to use Send App, please visit https://send.flutterwave.com.

About Flutterwave

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Flutterwave is the leading payments technology company that allows businesses across the world to expand their operations in Africa and other emerging markets by enabling local and cross-border transactions via one Application Programming Interface (API). The company has an infrastructure reach in 34 African countries and enables cross-border transactions from the diaspora to African countries via its Send App remittance product. Flutterwave has processed over 630M transactions in excess of USD $31B, serves global and African customers like Uber, Air Peace, Bamboo, PiggyVest, and across various industries. For more information on Flutterwave’s journey, please visit www.flutterwave.com.

About Send App by Flutterwave

Launched in 2021, Send App by Flutterwave, Africa’s leading payment technology company, allows Africans in the diaspora to send money back home conveniently.

Send App supports multiple currencies, ensuring fast and reliable transfers to and or from over 30 countries. It offers 24/7 in-app assistance and adheres to the highest global security standards, including ISO certifications and compliance with PCI DSS, for the safety of user data and funds. For more information on Send App, please visit https://send.flutterwave.com.

About MainStreet Bank and Avenu

MainStreet Bank is a $2 billion-asset community bank with a culture of innovation headquartered in Fairfax, Virginia. Its proprietary Avenu Software as a Service (SaaS) platform is the only embedded banking solution that connects bank partners and their apps directly and seamlessly to a purpose-built bank owned and designed core solution. Learn more about MainStreet Bank at mstreetbank.com, and visit www.avenu.bank for an overview of Avenu.

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