Abyd Karmali

Abyd Karmali is Managing Director and Global Head of Carbon Emissions at investment bank Merrill Lynch. As representative of Merrill Lynch, he signed the contract with Dorjee Sun for the world's first avoided deforestation project, in Aceh, Indonesia.

Merrill Lynch is one of the world's leading wealth management, capital markets and advisory companies. The company was founded in 1914, and has total client assets of approximately $1.8 trillion. As an investment bank, it is a leading global trader and underwriter of securities and derivatives across a broad range of asset classes and serves as a strategic advisor to corporations, governments, institutions and individuals worldwide. Merrill Lynch also owns approximately half of BlackRock, one of the world's largest publicly traded investment management companies, with more than $1 trillion in assets under management.

Abyd has worked for 18 years on climate change and the carbon markets and serves as President of the Carbon Markets and Investors Association and member of Her Majesty's Treasury Carbon Market Expert Group. He is the point person for carbon business opportunities across Merrill Lynch's geographies and financial products and serves on the firm's Environmental Sustainability Working Group. He has provided strategic advice on the commercial risks and opportunities posed by carbon emissions constraints to dozens of European, US, and Asian companies in the FT Global 500 as well as to several government agencies and regional development banks.

Abyd holds a M.S. in Technology and Policy from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and was previously employed with ICF International in Washington DC, Toronto, and London where he served most recently as Managing Director, Europe. In 1996-97 he was Climate Change Officer at the United Nations Environment Programme's Industry office in Paris and participated in the Kyoto Protocol negotiations.

His voluntary sector activity includes work with the agencies of the Aga Khan Development Network and a three-year stint on the Board of Trustees of Focus Humanitarian Assistance Europe Foundation. He is a running, football, world music, adventure travel, and gastronomy enthusiast.