78 meetings in four weeks. Michael O’Loughlin, USA Ambassador for the MENA Fintech Association and Managing Partner at Argonautic Global, extended a trip to Ireland to understand what the country is building. He wanted to see how it compares with what he has been helping build in Saudi Arabia and the wider MENA region.
He joins Johnny Fernandez on FinTech TV with the framing that settles the comparison. MENA does ambition, capital and speed exceptionally well, as Money20/20 Middle East in Riyadh showed. Ireland’s advantage is something different: domain expertise, talent, global technology companies, universities and a small-country ecosystem where regulators know the startups and startups know the capital.
The conversation comes as Ireland rolls out its Ireland for Finance Strategy 2026-2030, launched in August. The strategy targets 70,000 people employed in international financial services by 2030, up from around 61,000 across more than 600 firms today.
On the global AI race, O’Loughlin’s read is grounded and optimistic. Ireland can be the testbed: a place to apply new AI innovation to real, practical problems, prove it and showcase it to the world. It already has deep global financial and technology infrastructure on its doorstep.
His conclusion: the winners will not necessarily invent everything. They will connect everything.
Guest: Michael O’Loughlin, USA Ambassador, MENA Fintech Association; Managing Partner, Argonautic Global
Interviewer: Johnny Fernandez, FinTech TV
