Roy Ratnavel
Retired Financial Services Executive
Roy Ratnavel was born in 1969 in the capital city of Colombo, Sri Lanka. At the age of seventeen, he became a political prisoner and spent grueling months in brutal and oppressive conditions. After his miraculous release from prison, he arrived in Canada all alone at the age of eighteen with $50 in his pocket, then rose from the mailroom to the boardroom. He is now a retired Bay Street executive who was the Vice Chairman of Canada’s largest independent asset management company. Roy is also the recipient of Report on Business, Canada’s 50 Best Executives 2020 award.
He is involved in many philanthropic causes—including the 2019 successful summit of Mount Kilimanjaro to bring awareness and shatter the stigma surrounding mental illness and to raise money for the fight against this debilitating health issue. He is a mentor to many emerging young leaders in the asset management business. Roy is a keynote speaker and a bestselling author. His debut book, Prisoner #1056, quickly became a national bestseller in Canada and earned a bronze medal for best business memoir at the Axiom Book Awards in the United States.