In this episode, host Marika Torsdotter sits down with Luma Zitani, a financial crime practitioner with 20 years of experience across small banks, large banks, and consultancy. Originally from Syria, Luma brings a perspective to this work that goes far beyond regulation — for her, financial crime prevention is deeply personal, and the stakes have never been abstract.

Luma opens up about what keeps her in the field two decades on: the intellectual challenge, the geopolitical pulse of it all, and the genuine conviction that her day job makes the world a little more just. She unpacks why economists make surprisingly great financial crime specialists — because understanding macro cause-and-effect and thinking like a criminal are more connected than most people realize.

The episode's standout moment is Luma's account of a quiet, unsung win: how she and her team war-gamed a major sanctions scenario before it happened, modeled every resource and volume implication, and when the sanctions finally hit, they were operational and screening within a day — a full 10 days ahead of every other bank. Nobody outside the room ever knew.

Luma also sounds a clear warning about a worrying trend: after years of progress on financial inclusion, the pendulum is swinging back. Debanking whole countries and communities is becoming fashionable again — and she's fighting hard to make sure it doesn't go all the way.

Topics covered:

  • Why financial crime prevention needs to feel vocational, not just like a job
  • The personal stakes: growing up in Syria and why fighting financial crime matters
  • What economists bring to financial crime that law enforcement backgrounds don't
  • What women uniquely bring to the field — reading people, minimizing harm, the pastoral dimension
  • The aging technology problem: legacy systems vs. rapidly evolving criminal tools
  • Why the future belongs to "super geeks" who embrace new technology
  • The financial exclusion pendulum: from debanking charities to a worrying swing back
  • The untold war room story: being 10 days ahead of every other bank when major sanctions hit
  • Catastrophizing as a compliance superpower — why stress-testing scenarios saves lives

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