Why Us

Stu Burns

Chief Executive Officer

Stu has over 20 years’ experience working in Interest Rate Derivatives, Futures, Money Market, Fixed Interest, Structured Credit and Equity Products. He has built and managed businesses for both WBC Financial Markets and CBA Global Markets dealing interest rate products to wholesale investors. As a Director of Longreach Capital Markets (partially owned by JP Morgan) was responsible for the issuance of over $600million of Capital Protected Credit & Equity linked notes. More recently he has been a principal of SR2 Capital and Denison Financial Advisory originating $500million in infrastructure loans and advising on wholesale investors income portfolios.

Rod Lewis

Chairman

Rod has over 30 years’ experience in banking and financial markets. Rod spent 10 years with First Boston Australia as Director of fixed Income and 17 years with CBA Global Markets. Rod’s CBA experience included 6 years as head of Fixed Income trading followed by 5 years as Head of Debt Syndicate. Rod then spent 6 years as Head of Global Markets trading with responsibility for teams trading FX, Commodities, Derivatives and Fixed Income globally. Rod was a member of the AFMA Market Governance committee for 6 years. For the last 4 years Rod has consulted on product design and markets with Yieldbroker, Australia’s largest established electronic market for Australian Interest Rate Securities and Derivatives.

Tom Rowe

Chief Operating Officer

Tom is a treasury professional with applied markets experience gained from roles held in banking, mining and food-manufacturing industries. He brings an in-depth knowledge of foreign exchange, interest rate and commodity markets from a sales, product structuring and hedging policy point of view. He approaches problems with a continuous-improvement/audit mindset specifically looking at where technology can be better utilised to streamline processes, reduce operational risk and improve compliance.

Jala Burns

Head of Institutions

Jala is an experienced financial markets practitioner with over 25 years’ experience predominantly in Foreign Exchange and Interest Rates. Deep product knowledge that encompasses both developed and emerging markets – including associated derivatives & technology platforms. Jala has built businesses from ground zero for Investment Banks in Australia. A solutions based approach encompassing legal, credit, technology and tax, resulted in streamlined onboarding and sales. Having seen foreign exchange markets transition to platform, her experience will bring significant benefits to the digital transformation of money and debt securities markets onto Imperium marketplace.

Nathan Lusted

Head of Bank Relationships

Nathan has almost 3 decades of international markets, business transformation, leadership and relationship management. Nathan has a blend of strategic thinking and hands-on execution, consistently driving significant revenue growth with compliant sales. Businesses lead by Nathan have continually concentrated on improving experiences for the customer with logical and adaptive solutions, while remaining a high-performing business.

Sylvia Qiu

Data Scientist

Sylvia has cross-industry experience spanning both global technology and financial services. Prior to joining Imperium Markets, she worked at Alibaba, where she developed a strong foundation in digital platform operations and user-centric design.

Holding a Master’s degree in Data Analytics from the University of Sydney, Sylvia brings a practical understanding of fixed income markets, data analysis, and platform management — with a focus on user experience, timely insights, and scalable growth. She approaches problem-solving with a product-driven mindset, actively seeking ways to enhance workflow efficiency and improve reporting accuracy.

Chris Weeks

Advisory Board

Chris is a Principal in DTW with over 35 years’ experience in the credit markets encompassing senior positions in London, Paris, New York and Sydney.

His experience includes origination, credit selection, analysis and credit portfolio management spanning a wide array of debt constructs including structured finance, project finance, infrastructure debt, leveraged loans, and commercial real estate.

Chris has been responsible for originating, structuring and distributing a number of pioneering transactions throughout his career.

As the Chairman and CEO of MBIA UK Insurance Limited (an FSA regulated insurance company based in London) for 10 years Chris was responsible for a debt portfolio of circa USD 40 billion and was also a member of the investment committee responsible for overseeing the management of the company’s investment portfolio. Chris held the following FSA (now the FCA)regulatory approvals: CF Director, CF3 Chief Executive and CF8 Apportionment and oversight.

Prior to this role Chris ran MBIA’s CLO activities based in NY and was responsible for a portfolio of more than USD 50 billion including significant exposure to the leveraged loan and middle market loan asset classes.

Chris also ran MBIA’s Pan Asian business for several years. Prior to that he ran MBIA’s European Structured Finance business and was also formerly head of Société Générale’s European Securitisation team based in Paris.

Curt Zuber

Advisory Board

Curt has over 35 years of experience in banking, finance, treasury, risk management, and executive leadership across Australia and the USA.

He spent the majority of his career at Westpac, culminating in his role as Chief Executive Officer of Westpac Institutional Bank. Prior to that, he worked in Westpac’s Group Treasury department for nearly 25 years, including 16 years as Group Treasurer, where he chaired the bank’s Asset and Liability Committee. As Treasurer, Curt guided the bank through significant challenges, including the global financial crisis and the Covid-19 pandemic, making a notable impact on strengthening Westpac’s balance sheet and organizational resilience.

Earlier in his career, Curt worked at Household International in both its Chicago and Sydney offices, with responsibilities spanning funding, liquidity management, trading, risk management, and hedging strategies.

Curt currently serves on the Advisory Board of the Australian Office of Financial Management, which issues debt securities on behalf of the Australian Government. He is also Chair of the Bestest Foundation and a Director of the Gotcha4Life Foundation.