January brought the slightly unnerving news that ex-UK prime minister Theresa May has been signed up to speak at the structured finance industry’s biggest annual bunfight, the SFVegas conference, which takes place in Las Vegas on February 23 to 26.
The event, appropriately held in one of Las Vegas’s largest casinos, is best known outside the industry for its appearance in the 2015 movie The Big Short, in which it was cast in a less than favourable light as a huge meeting of charlatan financiers ready to fleece their own grandmothers.
Perhaps proving that even securitization professionals are capable of some self-reflection, the author of the book on which the film is based, Michael Lewis, spoke at the conference last year.
The event is also famous within the ABS community for hosting a discussion on women in the industry in 2017 in which all of the participants bar the moderator were men.
High-ranking females
May is joined on the ticket by Donna Brazile, former interim chair of the Democratic National Committee, and Kyrsten Sinema, Democratic senator for Arizona.