Mr Salman Al Sooj brings with him 17 years of invaluable experience in the financial industry, primarily within the banking sector. Currently, he serves as the Director of AML/CFT Supervision at the QFCRA. Mr Al Sooj’s career with the QFCRA began in 2012, where he served as an Associate in Banking Supervision and steadily progressed to become an Associate Director and team leader.

Mr Al Sooj’s professional path commenced with a role in a multinational bank in Qatar, where he gained diverse experience across retail, treasury, and corporate banking services.

During his tenure in Banking Supervision at the QFCRA, Mr Al Sooj leveraged his industry expertise to refine supervisory processes focused on ensuring effective corporate governance, compliance and risk management practices across regulated institutions.

His keen interest in data analytics and visualization enabled him to enhance regulatory reporting, business intelligence tools and analytical capabilities, leading to actionable insights.

Mr Al Sooj earned his bachelor’s degree in Finance from Qatar University. While working at the QFCRA, he pursued a master’s degree from HEC Paris in Qatar, graduating with distinction in Strategic Business Unit Management with a Specialization in Financial Regulation. His thesis, titled “The Implications of FinTech Adoption on Regulation and Financial Services,” showcased his expertise in the field.

Mr Al Sooj has played a pivotal role within the organisation, mentoring and nurturing young local talent. His demonstrated skills and expertise have propelled him to a leadership position within the QFCRA’s core business of Supervision.

Nurein Said Mohamed joined the QFC Regulatory Authority in June 2008 as Senior Manager in Internal Audit and was promoted to his present role in January 2017.

He began his career with PricewaterhouseCoopers in Kenya from where he attained his Certified Public Accountant (CPA) and Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA) designations. Mr Mohamed subsequently spent four years at Barclays Bank in Kenya in various roles, the last of which was Regional Head of Risk and Control Assessments for Africa and the Middle East and Acting Head of Operational Risk.

There, he was a key member of the Basel II operational risk workstream for the Advanced Measurement Approach waiver application.

He graduated from ICMA Centre, Henley Business School with MSc International Securities, Investment and Banking. He is also a Fellow, Chartered Institute of Securities & Investments, a Certified Internal Auditor and also holds the CAMS designation.

Prior to the Regulatory Authority, Mr Mohamed was with a start-up Islamic bank as Head of Risk and Compliance.

Mr. Cova has over 25 years of experience in the financial regulatory sector, and is currently the Director of Investment Managers, Advisors, and Securities Supervision. Mr. Cova’s expertise includes financial supervision and regulation of collective investment schemes, investment institutions, fund administrators, trust service providers, securities exchanges, and other securities intermediaries.

Prior to his current position, Mr. Cova occupied a wide variety of positions within the Central Bank of Curaçao and Sint Maarten (formerly the Central Bank of the Netherlands Antilles). Mr. Cova’s responsibilities included assisting with the Mutual Evaluations of the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force (Anti-Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing) and the Peer Reviews of the Global Forum of Transparency and Exchange of Information of the OECD for both Curaçao and Sint Maarten.

Additionally, Mr. Cova led the Expert Supervision division which was responsible for the Central Bank’s expertise centrum in expert areas of Corporate Governance, AML Compliance, Market Conduct and Integrity, Fraud Prevention, and Financial Education and Resilience.

Mr. Cova also chaired the Innovation Platform of the Central Bank, which functioned as the Innovation Hub.

Mr. Cova holds a master’s degree in business administration with specialisation in international business and finance, and a bachelor’s degree in industrial engineering.

Perttu Korhonen, currently leading the Financial Analysis and Innovation department at the QFCRA, has a 20-year background in analysis, analytics, and data strategies, mainly in EU and UK central banks and regulators. He began his career at the Finnish Financial Supervisory Authority, focusing on the Finnish banking sector and later worked in analytical roles with the European Central Bank and the UK Financial Services Authority (FSA). His skills in IT and analytical methods led to significant roles in tool development and data strategy in Finland and the UK.

At the UK FSA, Mr Korhonen played a key role in integrating regulatory data with the Bank of England (BoE). As the Data Strategy Adviser for the BoE’s Financial Stability department, he co-founded the Bank’s Data Lab, enhancing big data and advanced analytics use. His work included analysing the UK property market using innovative data matching and visual analytics.

Following his tenure at Deloitte UK, Mr Korhonen returned to BoE to develop machine learning approaches for data quality assurance in loan-level data collection. In his current role, Mr Korhonen is instrumental in incorporating AI into the QFCRA's supervisory decision-making processes.

Mr Korhonen holds a master’s degree in economics from the University of Helsinki.