Finance Brief: Ex-KPMG partners form new firm without ‘macho’ culture, top Lloyd’s of London brokerage dismisses SVP for explicit email & more

DON’T HATE THE PLAYER(S): Former KPMG partners Maggie Brereton and Ina Kjaer, who quit the firm earlier this year because of concerns about bullying, have launched a rival consultancy called Eos Deal Advisory. The pair said their new endeavor will be a departure from the “macho” culture entrenched in the industry. “The business will allow minorities and women who walked out of the market to feel like they want to work in it,” Kjaer told the Financial Times. “Many feel like they cannot participate in this market. We will bring proper diversity into this market” [FT]. Alpha Advisory Partners’ founder and CEO, Sheila Hooda, was appointed to the board of ProSight Global [Broadsheet]. American Express’s senior vice president of global fraud, Tina Eide, discusses how the credit card company is trying to step up its anti-fraud efforts using machine learning [American Banker].

KISS OFF: Guy Carpenter & Co., a top Lloyd’s of London insurance brokerage, dismissed a senior vice president for sending a sexually explicit email about a female co-worker to several team members. Two other people involved in the incident were disciplined in the incident [Insurance Journal].

(VERY NECESSARY) REFORM ACADEMY: The American Economic Association is banning employers from interviewing aspiring professional economists in hotel rooms during their annual conference, a practice that has been the standard for years. “It was not unusual when I was a job-market candidate to walk into a hotel room and see a roomful of men, and be invited to sit on the bed for a job interview,” Jessica Holmes, an economics professor at Middlebury College, told the Wall Street Journal. The move is intended to help put an end to what the association’s current president, former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, characterized as the profession’s “reputation for hostility toward women and minorities” [WSJ]. Banks in the United Arab Emirates recently received a letter from the country’s central bank instructing them to treat female and male customers the same when it comes to loans and other credit facilities, as well as other transactions. While the UAE ranked highest among Gulf countries when it comes to gender equality in a 2018 United Nations study, gender discrimination is still an entrenched issue, particularly when it comes to the laws surrounding domestic violence, marriage and divorce [Arabian Business].