Muhamad Umar Swift

Datuk Muhamad Umar Swift graduated with a Bachelor of Economics degree from Monash University, Australia, and is an associate of Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand, a member of CPA Australia, a chartered tax advisor of The Tax Institute of Australia and a fellow of the Financial Services Institute of Australasia in Australia. He is also a chartered accountant with the Malaysian Institute of Accountants, and a registered financial planner.

Umar has more than 25 years of experience in the areas of banking and financial services. He commenced his career with Price Waterhouse Chartered Accountants in 1986 and moved to the Corporate Finance Division of Bank of Singapore (Australia) in 1992, where he advanced his banking career in various positions before joining Gas Malaysia as the general manager of corporate finance in 1996. A year later, he was promoted to CEO of Gas Malaysia.

Umar became a practice leader for the utilities business of Deloitte Consulting in Malaysia in 2002, before reentering the financial services industry as the executive vice-president–head of the Enterprise Financial Services Group of Maybank in 2004. In 2006, he was appointed as CEO/group managing director of MAA Group, where he also assumed the role of CEO of Malaysian Assurance Alliance (now known as Zurich Insurance Malaysia).

Umar is currently CEO of Bursa Malaysia, where he is leading the exchange to fulfill its vision of becoming ASEAN’s leading, responsible and globally connected marketplace, by offering diversified opportunities for those seeking to invest with impact and achieve value. He is also the director of all subsidiary companies within Bursa Malaysia Group, and serves as the chairman of Bursa Malaysia Derivatives and Bursa Malaysia Derivatives Clearing.

Umar sits on the board of the Securities Industry Development Corporation and is an appointed member of ‘Anugerah Kecemerlangan Industri’, Malaysia’s premier corporate recognition award introduced by the Ministry of International Trade and Industry to acknowledge outstanding Malaysian companies. He is also a member of the Financial Reporting Foundation appointed by the Ministry of Finance.