The Panelists will be:

· Andrew Walker, Chief Innovation Officer, Tweetminster
· Francesco Burelli, Partner, Value Partners
· Christophe Langlois, Founder and CEO, VisibleBanking.com
· Jeremy Harris, IP/Litigation Partner, Kemp Little

Chris Skinner, Chairman of The Financial Services Club will Chair the Debate.

Social media has recently been named one of the largest emerging risks industry leaders need to account for. How could social media damage the reputation of your bank? What can you do to limit the impact and how can social media become the risk manager's friend instead of potential foe? Social media expert, Andrew Walker of Tweetminster will walk through the challenge and opportunities, followed by an overview from Francesco Burelli of new research developed by Value Partners reviewing the state of social media usage within the banks and financial markets. After the presentations, there will be a panel discussion of the implications for banks with Christophe Langlois, well known expert in social media in banking, leading the debate and also including Jeremy Harris of Kemp Little.

Tweetminster is a media utility that helps people and organisations discover the most relevant content, trends and insight around their personal and professional interests. Launched in 2008 with a focus on UK politics, Tweetminster identifies networks of experts and influencers on Twitter around financial markets, global politics or any issue, industry and geography, and analyses the Tweets within these networks to discover what influencers are paying attention to - the tweets, the most shared news stories, the trends and the people shaping and driving the conversations. In short, Tweetminster tells you what matters around any topic, industry, news event or market.

Andrew Walker is co-founder and CIO (Chief Innovation Officer). Andrew’s role is focused on developing the Tweetminster technology platform into the next generation of social news products. He has worked as an interactive, games and web designer & developer since 1995. Co-founding creative technology agency Thin Martian with Bradley Martin and James Clarke, he has spent years creating products and campaigns and social media presences for online brands like Microsoft, Vodafone, Xbox and BSkyB.

Francesco Burelli is a partner with Value Partners in London with a focus on retail, corporate and transaction banking. He is an expert in cards, payments and transaction banking with experience ranging from regional banks, payment schemes and processors, infrastructure providers, clearing networks, major international banks, to merchants and corporations across four continents. Francesco is a member of the VRL Financial News editorial board for cards, payments and consumer credit. Before joining Value Partners, Francesco covered executive roles with other consulting firms and previous to this, worked at HSBC. Francesco is a Fellow of the Institute of Financial Services in the UK.

Christophe Langlois is a trusted advisor to the worldwide financial services industry. In early 2007, Christophe founded VisibleBanking.com which quickly became one of the most trusted sources of news and opinions on the topics of social media and digital innovations in financial services. The Visible Banking team have access to some unique insights from our benchmark of well over 3,000 social media assets on the likes of facebook or twitter from financial institutions in 80+ countries. In the last six years, Christophe has contributed to over 120 events in 16 countries as organizer, chairperson, keynote speaker and moderator. Christophe is also a social media planner at The Social Partners in London (part of Grey, and a WPP global network company), where his main responsibility is to shape the global social media strategy for one of the leading insurance groups worldwide. Before founding VisibleBanking.com, Christophe was a senior innovation manager at leading UK bank.

Jeremy Harris is a partner in the IP & Litigation team at the leading technology law firm Kemp Little. Jeremy is an intellectual property specialist, advising clients on both contentious and non-contentious issues across the whole spectrum of IP rights. In addition, Jeremy has significant experience of advising clients on social media law, with particular expertise in the areas of user generated content, liability of online service providers, the creation, ownership and use of social media data and patenting of social media inventions.