Robert Madsen

Expertise: international and national politics, trade and finance, the global financial imbalances, exchange-rate regimes and reserves management, fiscal and monetary policy, sovereign debt and bonds, banking, regulatory and industrial policy, energy and commodities markets, automobiles and other manufacturing industries, economic and financial forecasting

Robert Madsen is an expert on global economics, politics and geopolitics who advises investment groups and operational companies.  Among other positions, he was Asia Strategist at Soros Private Funds Management, Executive Counselor at Unison Capital (Japan’s premier private equity firm), Advisor and Limited Partner in the Robert M. Bass Group’s operations in Japanese real estate, and Senior Economist at an Asian fund of funds.  He has also enjoyed long-term consulting relationships with Caxton Associates and one of the super-major oil companies and has done specific projects for a dozen other financial institutions as well as for firms in the public relations business, and in the automobile, real estate, hospitality, mining & minerals, and technology industries. 

One of Madsen’s resources is strong relationships with experts and decision-makers in several governments, multinational organizations, and academia.  He has advised three foreign ministries, two finance ministries two central banks, and a number of other agencies.  He also worked for the Economist Intelligence Unit from 1997 to 2013, writing many of their country reports and forecasts as well as contributing to regional and global analysis.  He was a Fellow at Stanford University’s Asia-Pacific Research Center from 1997 to 2004 and then Senior Fellow at MIT’s Center for International Studies for over a decade.  These connections allow him to bring governmental, academic and business perspectives together in evaluating particular international developments or investment questions.

Robert's articles and interviews have appeared in the BBC, CNBC, The Economist, the Far Eastern Economic Review, the Financial Times, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, The National Interest, the Nikkei Newspaper, NPR, the McKinsey Quarterly,  the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, and other fora. Several times a year he speaks on economic and political subjects to business conferences, industry associations, government groups, and civic organizations.

He was trained at Harvard, where he graduated summa cum laude in East Asian Languages and Civilizations; Oxford University, where as a Rhodes Scholar he earned a master’s and a doctorate in International Relations; and Stanford Law School, where he won prizes both in international law and in law and economics.  Rather than become an attorney, however, he joined McKinsey & Company to gain a basic education in business before combining that, his international experience, and his driving interest in global economics and finance, in his present career.

Specialties:Geographical expertise: global affairs, East Asia, Europe, China, Japan, the Middle East, the United States, and the developing economies.

Substantive expertise: international and national politics, trade and finance, the global financial imbalances, exchange-rate regimes (including the Eurozone and its problems) and reserves management, fiscal and monetary policy (including quantitative easing and negative interest rates), sovereign debt and bonds, banking, regulatory and industrial policy, energy and commodities markets (including oil prices, ISIS and Middle Eastern military affairs), automobiles and other manufacturing industries, and economic and financial forecasting.

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Expert Information

Resources

Expertise

international and national politics, trade and finance, the global financial imbalances, exchange-rate regimes and reserves management, fiscal and monetary policy, sovereign debt and bonds, banking, regulatory and industrial policy, energy and commodities markets, automobiles and other manufacturing industries, economic and financial forecasting

Location

San Francisco

Experience

Current Experience

Senior Fellow at Center for International Studies, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Past Experience

  • Executive Councillor, Unison Capital
  • Author, Japan Country Reports Economist Intelligence Unit
  • Consultant, Caxton Associates
  • Senior Advisor and Economist, Asia Alternatives
  • Asia Strategist, Soros Private Funds Management

Education

  • M. Phil, D.Phil., International Relations, University of Oxford
  • J.D., Jurisprudence, Stanford University Law School
  • AB, East Asian Languages and Civilizations, Harvard University