Nicholas Brooks is head of research and investment strategy at ETF Securities. Earlier, Nicholas was a senior member of Henderson Global Investors’ asset allocation and strategy team, and before that he was senior economist on Deutsche Bank’s global markets strategy and economics team. Nicholas has a BA from Brown University, an MA from Columbia University, an MSc in Economics from the University of London, and has completed work on a PhD thesis examining financial fragility and the dynamics of financial crisis.

Dimitris Melas is executive director of research at MSCI. His team conducts research to support the firm’s index and analytics products. Before joining MSCI in 2006, Mr. Dimitris was head of research and head of quantitative strategies at HSBC Asset Management. He has an MSc in Electrical Engineering, an MBA in Finance and he has completed a PhD thesis at the London School of Economics on financial applications of optimal control theory.

Gavan Nolan is a director of credit research at Markit and a CDS market specialist. Having joined Markit in 2001, Gavan has written about the credit markets from the accounting scandals of the last decade right through to the current European sovereign debt crisis. Prior to this, he worked at J.P. Morgan in interest rate markets. Gavan holds a BSc degree in economics from Queen Mary College, University of London.

Gareth Parker is director of index research, design and development, EMEA, at Russell Indexes, where he is responsible for the design, development and product management of Russell’s European index range. He has particular interest in the indexation of non-linear payoffs, less correlated markets, and complex strategies. Gareth has an MA in Philosophy, Politics & Economics from New College, Oxford.

Tobias Sproehnle is a director of credit data and indices at Markit. Tobias joined Markit in 2006 to manage the Markit iTraxx series of credit default swap (CDS) indices in Europe and Asia. Prior to Markit, Tobias was responsible for product development and strategy for fixed income and credit derivatives at Eurex. Tobias holds a diploma in economics and information management from the University of Wuerzburg, Germany, and is a Chartered Financial Analyst.