The Assembly Australasia

Mr Brendan Thomas commenced his 5-year appointment as AUSTRAC Chief Executive Officer (CEO) on 29 January 2024.

As AUSTRAC CEO, Brendan leads Australia’s financial intelligence unit and anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing (AML/CTF) regulator.

AUSTRAC’s regulation hardens the financial sector against criminal exploitation and its intelligence provides crucial information to its national security, domestic and international law enforcement partners.

Brendan is AUSTRAC’s representative on the ACIC Board, the Serious Financial Crime Taskforce CEO Board, and the Criminal Justice and Law Enforcement Forum. In view of AUSTRAC’s role as a member of the National Intelligence Community (NIC), Brendan is also responsible for agency head-level engagement with the Office of National Intelligence and other NIC members.

Brendan is a Wiradjuri man, with significant experience in leading, designing and delivering major public services, especially in the criminal and civil justice systems in NSW, and in leading organisational reform.

Ahead of his commencement with AUSTRAC, Brendan served as a Deputy Secretary at the NSW Department of Communities and Justice, with responsibility for implementing major changes to reduce the over-representation of the Indigenous population in the NSW criminal and child protection systems. Prior to this, Brendan was the CEO of Legal Aid NSW and was formerly the Deputy Secretary at the NSW Department of Justice.

Brendan has a Bachelor of Arts from Macquarie University and is a fellow of the Australian and New Zealand School of Government.

Armina Antoniou has over 20 years of experience as a risk and legal professional with significant gaming and risk management experience.

Armina joined Crown Resorts in 2021 as the Group Executive GM, Financial Crime Risk and is now the Chief Risk Officer (CRO) of Crown Resorts, where she leads teams who continue to embed risk transformation across Crown’s multiple properties.

Armina was previously with Australian gaming company, Tabcorp, for more than 10 years where she held a number of roles in legal and risk management. Prior to that, Armina spent more than a decade as a litigator and corporate lawyer at one of Australia’s leading law firms.

Armina is a passionate advocate for diversity and inclusion, a sports fan and a soccer mum.

Kieran Beer is chief analyst and director of editorial content with responsibility for ACAMS moneylaundering.com, ACAMS Today and content for many ACAMS conferences and other programs. Prior to joining ACAMS in 2006, he was executive editor of Bloomberg Wealth Manager, an award winning investment and financial planning magazine, and he also served as a staff writer for Bloomberg Markets Magazine.

Kieran has been a financial journalist for more than 30 years, beginning his career at Institutional Investor. He subsequently served as editor-in-chief of The Bond Buyer, founding editor of Thomson Municipal Market Monitor, and editor at the American Banker.

Kieran speaks regularly at industry conferences, has appeared on CNBC and Sky News, and has been heard on WBBR and NPR. He writes a column on anti-financial crime issues and is the host of “Financial Crime Matters,” a podcast series, as well ACAMS videocasts on YouTube.

Rachelle has 30 years of experience in risk and compliance within financial services, policy, regulatory, and law enforcement sectors. She has held leadership roles at AUSTRAC and at the FATF. Rachelle focuses on building and delivering effective solutions to manage financial crime risk.

Gavin Coles has had a 30 year career in identifying, investigating, and preventing financial crime risk, across Asia, Australasia, Europe, and the United States. He has worked for the National Criminal Intelligence Service and Cabinet Office in the UK, been an AML officer for Banks in four countries, and spent almost ten years in Private Banking for Citi at the international level overseeing the AML Program. He is proud to be part of the world-leading AML professional community in Australasia, where ability to move rapidly and try new approaches has resulted in ground breaking advancements in the fight against financial crime. He now consults to organisations across Australasia and elsewhere on financial crime and AML risk issues, providing practical advice to Boards and Executives.

Todd is the Head of AML and Compliance, with a diverse career spanning casino, banking, consulting, and advisory services. He brings deep expertise in AML/CTF shaped by frontline experience in law enforcement and intelligence. Todd previously led tactical analysis teams at AUSTRAC and has delivered strategic compliance solutions across both private and public sectors. His leadership is grounded in operational insight, regulatory engagement, and a commitment to financial crime prevention.

Caryn is the Regional Anti-Money Laundering (AML) Director – APAC for ACAMS, where she is the lead English speaking SME practitioner on AML and Financial Crime Compliance across the APAC region. Working closely with APAC and international colleagues, Caryn plays a key role in shaping ACAMS priorities, offerings, and activities across the APAC region.

Caryn brings to ACAMS a wealth of AFC global banking experience that spans Standard Chartered, JP Morgan, Clearstream Banking, UBS AG, ABN Amro and Bank of America. Most recently she was the Head of Financial Crime Compliance Controls, Surveillance Excellence with Standard Chartered Bank, where she was responsible for the end to end process, governance, and risk management of the group wide alert disposition process. Caryn’s expertise covers Client Due Diligence, financial crime business advisory, project management, governance, risk management, and the overarching financial crime compliance framework.

Jeremy Moller is a risk advisory lawyer based in Sydney. He has over 15 years' experience working in Australia, the United Kingdom and New Zealand as a lawyer specialising in anti-money laundering, international sanctions and export controls as well as foreign transparency and influence. Jeremy’s work includes leading, implementing and reviewing financial crime programs, such as conducting business wide risk assessments, as well as advising on litigation arising out of regulatory investigations and acting on Royal Commissions.

Jeremy recognises the importance of both improving customer experience and ensuring compliance. Having led an in-house risk and compliance function for an international law firm, he has a unique understanding of the synergies between both legal compliance and operational risk management. For this reason he has a particular interest in the launch of Australia’s new government led Digital ID and how this can benefit existing and new reporting entities with undertaking customer due diligence.

Jill Muir joined CA ANZ in January 2021. Jill represents members' interests in key policy areas including anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing, consumer data right, insolvency, and the digital ID ecosystem. Prior to joining CA ANZ, Jill was the Director of Advocacy with Australia’s Small Business and Family Enterprise Ombudsman having focused her career on advocating for small businesses from within government.

Chris leads NAB’s Group Investigations portfolio which is responsible for the prevention, detection, investigation, analysis and remediation of fraud, bribery, corruption and serious misconduct across the NAB Group.  His team also conducts all NAB’s financial crime investigations and collaborates closely with AUSTRAC and law enforcement to help keep the bank, customers and the community safe.  In addition to his operational responsibilities Chris is also leading NAB’s fraud strategic change program including the employee surveillance program and significant investment in automation, AI and machine learning to combat fraud and protect customers. He is a member of the board of the Australian Financial Crimes Exchange and the Victoria Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission’s Audit and Risk Committee. Prior to joining NAB Chris was a senior executive with the AFP with 28 years international and domestic law enforcement experience in national security, organised crime and crisis management.