About us

International payments to match your ambitions

The markets never stop moving. And neither do we

Meet us

We're one of the most experienced teams in foreign exchange. Even more importantly, we're a group of people who care and who'll pull out all the stops to make sure you get the most from your currency exchange.

Below you can put a face to the name of the WorldFirst management team. And learn a little more about what makes them tick.

View our Global Executive Team
View the Australia Management Team

Jonathan Quin

Chief Executive Officer & Co-founder

Graduated with Law and Accountancy degree from the University of Edinburgh. Started at Citibank as a trader and later headed the European sales of online FX trading products. Moved to RBS as the Head of Business Development in the Financial Markets Division. Co-founded WorldFirst in January 2004.

Kelly Jackson

Chief People Officer

Graduated from UCL with a degree in Psychology. Went travelling around South East Asia and Australasia before starting her HR career at QAS Limited, a subsidiary of Experian Plc. Most recently headed up the HR team at Stemcor Ltd, a privately-owned international steel trading company. Joined WorldFirst as Group HR Director in November 2014.

Reg Dhanjal

Group General Counsel and Compliance Officer

Reg joined WorldFirst in 2017 and has responsibility for our legal, compliance, risk, financial crime, internal audit and company secretariat teams. Prior to WorldFirst, Reg held a number of roles and was most recently a Partner at the law firm Pinsent Masons. Reg graduated with a Law degree from the University of Cambridge.

Jeff Parker

Managing Director, Asia Pacific

Jeff was previously on the executive board at OFX – formerly OzForex – most recently in the role of Chief Enterprise Officer with responsibility for growing the B2B business globally. He also gained considerable financial services experience as a director at Macquarie Bank where he worked for the Investments and Advisory division. Jeff is also an ACMA qualified management accountant.

Kerry Tremble

Chief Financial Officer

Kerry is Group CFO of WorldFirst. Kerry was previously Deputy Finance Director for Lloyds Retail Bank and a partner in KPMG’s Corporate and Investment Banking Consulting practice. In the latter role, he worked with global investment banks in a range of areas including Business & Operational Strategy and Financial & Risk Management.

Craige Pendleton-Browne

Chief Technology Officer

With over 25 years experience in technology roles, Craige has worked as CTO in both Australia and the UK. His most recent roles include CTO for News Digital Media, iCareHealth, and OFX, Australia’s leading fintech business. In his last three roles Craige has owned both product development and technology delivery. He is passionate about how digital technology and Agile product development can drive commercial success.

Tim Rudman

Chief Operating Officer

Graduated with a bachelor's degree in Finance, Marketing and International Business in South Africa. Following a brief stint working in marketing, moved to London in 2007. Joined WorldFirst in 2008 as the desk assistant in the online sellers team before taking on a variety of roles including Head of Operations and, ultimately, COO.

Ray Ridgeway

Country Officer

After graduating with a BCom - Economics degree at UCT in South Africa, Ray moved to the London and worked in the financial service, tax and accounting industry. During his UK tenure he worked in various Account management, accounting, consulting and management positions before finding his ideal fit in Group Sales as Commercial Manager, across 3 countries. Ray joined WorldFirst Australia in 2012 as one of the Senior Business Development Managers, before building and heading up the Corporate Sales Desk, and then leading both Sales and Dealing functions, as Chief Commercial Officer. In 2017 Ray was promoted to Country Manager, WorldFirst Australia.

Paul Basson

Chief Operating Officer

Paul joined the WorldFirst team in 2008 initially running the middle office team for the London private client desk. In 2010 he relocated to the Australian office and is now the Operations Manager. Originally from Cape Town, Paul holds a degree in Politics and Economics from the University of Cape Town and previously worked in customer relations for a leading motor manufacturer.

Duncan Khoury

Head of Marketing - Australia

Duncan joined WorldFirst in 2014 and has over 12 years’ experience working in the Australian financial services industry. He previously held the role of Marketing Manager, Corporate & Global at Aon Risk Services and prior to this held numerous marketing and business insurance management roles over a 6 year period at Allianz Australia. Duncan holds qualifications in both Marketing & Law (University of Western Sydney) and Insurance/Risk Management (Deakin University), having also completed the 2 year Allianz Graduate Management Program in 2008.

Joan Jreij

HR Manager

In March 2017, Joan joined WorldFirst as HR Manager – Australia. After graduating with a HR Diploma she commenced her career within the recruitment industry. Joan commenced her HR career with Sony DADC – a subsidiary of Sony Corp eventually heading up the HR and WHS function in Australia and NZ. Joan is currently completing a master’s degree in HRM.

Our story

2004

Way back in April 2004 WorldFirst was born. In the basement of a house in Stockwell Jonathan Quin and Nick Robinson decided they were going to change how we change money. We also booked our first trade that month. And made a loss. Jabu Henson joined them four months later. He's still here as MD of our Asian offices, but more on that later.

2005

By the end of our first year we'd booked £43 million in trades. And by October that year we hit our first £100 million in transactions. In December the team had expanded to a hefty 8 members. And 7 of the 8 are still here!

2006

In January we outgrew our basement and moved to Crombie Mews in Battersea and used to enjoy meetings on our lovely roof terrace. That year we launched our Corporate desk with Alex Sullivan. Sir David Clementi (former Deputy Head of the Bank of England!) came on board WorldFirst as our Senior Advisor. A couple of months later Elisabeth Dobson joined as head of our Private desk.

2007

We started out the year with 22 employees and by the end we'd almost doubled, with 40 WorldFirsters in the team. Needless to say by the end of the year we were starting to burst at the seams. We also hit £1 billion in transactions and champagne popped!

2008

FSA authorisation was approved and we became the first foreign exchange broker in the UK to be able to sell currency options. We officially outgrew our old office and moved into our lovely new home in Regent House overlooking the Thames in Battersea. Nick Robinson also made the long long flight Down Under to open our second office in Sydney.

2009

Speedy automated payments? Done. In January we made the first of many SWIFT payments. Fancy some more champagne? Why not, we hit £2 billion in transactions. And a few months later we were awarded the Queen's Award for Enterprise. In October our WorldFirsters turned up decked out in pink for Breast Cancer Awareness. The first of many charity days to come. November saw us authorised as Payments Institution as well as our first appearance on Sunday Times Virgin Fast Track - position 53!

2010

Things were really starting to take off, in January we were awarded our first star with Sunday Times Best Companies to Work For. We also launched our online platform (over half our transactions go through this system now!). We love an opportunity to dress up, so Sports Relief in March saw some "interesting" ensembles around the office. We also won the Service Business of the Year via the Fast Growth Business Awards and were finalists in the National Business Awards for Customer Focus. In our private client survey 98% say they'd use us again and recommend us! In November we launched our new look and appeared for the 2nd year in the Sunday Times Virgin Fast Track - position 65.

2011

We were on a roll - awarded our 2nd star with Sunday Times Best Companies to Work For - happy days! In April we hit £5 billion in transactions and Sir David Clemnti became our Chairman. In July, 100% of respondents in our corporate client survey said they'd use us again and recommend us. Third year in a row on the Sunday Times Virgin Fast Track - position 81.

2012

Ended our 8th Financial Year with revenues just under £15 million, a big leap from our humble beginnings back in 2004! In June we celebrated our first WorldFirst wedding - Emily and Simon met at WorldFirst in 2008. In September we took on the US with John Min and John Green opening our first US office in Washington D.C. We were announced winners of the National Business Awards Customer Focus Award in November and we teamed up with Childreach International to help build a school in Tanzania - go team!

2013

Started the year seeing stars - we were awarded three of them in the Best Companies Guide! At the end of February we'd made more than 120,000 payments, and in September, our Australian team moved into bigger, brighter office and @World_First reached 9,000 followers on Twitter. In October we opened our Singapore office and Jabu was appointed the MD. We also won the UK Customer Experience Award the same month. By December the global WorldFirst team had cracked 200 employees.

2014

This is the year we celebrated our 10th birthday! The years have flown by and we now have more than 300 employees worldwide. In May we took out the Customer Focus category at the European Business Awards hosted in Athens. Jabu opened up our second Asian office, this time in Hong Kong. In summer, the UK team said farewell to Regent House and moved into Millbank Tower, across the river from the MI6 (so James Bond!). In September we made our millionth trade.

2015

Another year, more new offices! WorldFirst’s story continued with our launch in Singapore, new offices in Hong Kong and Virginia, and a new frontier broken by setting up business in Austin, Texas. The awards keep coming with a place on the Real Business Hot 100 and a top 30 placing in The Sunday Times ‘International Track 200’. We visited some of our UK clients, and filmed their WorldFirst stories. From gin makers to home buyers, we heard some inspiring currency transfer tales (and came face-to-face with the biggest dog you’ve ever seen). And in the UK, the newest Mr. Man character – our very own Mr. First – hit big screens, billboards and adverts in tube stations, train stations and in magazines & newspapers.

2016

Our busiest year yet! Across the world, we transferred more than £8.5 billion to over 137 countries from Australia to Zambia. In June, we opened an Amsterdam office, our very first in mainland Europe, bringing us to a grand total of six offices and over 600 staff (more to come!). October brought our inaugural Think Global event celebrating the opportunities of international trade, supported by UKTI and attended by Parliamentary Under-Secretary for International Trade, Mark Garnier MP. We launched a new service to help international sellers to sell in Japan, signed a platinum sponsorship deal with the Sydney Roosters and received the prestigious Queen's Award for International Trade. And most importantly, our clients kept showing us some love, giving us 98% positive feedback which meant we won the Feefo Gold Trusted Service award three years running.

So what are you waiting for?

Whatever you do now, or will do in the future, we can help you make the most of your money.

Discover more

+61 2 8298 4900

1 800 835 506