Programme

James Harding was appointed Editor of The Times in December 2007. Prior to this, he was The Times Business & City Editor having taken up the position in August 2006. Before joining The Times, James worked for the Financial Times. He was the FT’s Washington bureau chief from 2002-2004, having previously been the FT’s media editor for three years. Between 1996 and 1999, he was a correspondent in China, where he opened the Shanghai bureau for the FT – the first European newspaper to open an office in the city since the 1949 revolution. He started at the Financial Times in 1994 as a corporate reporter. Born in London in 1969, James studied History at Trinity College, Cambridge. He then learnt Japanese and went to work as a speechwriter in the office of Koichi Kato, then Japan’s chief cabinet secretary. From 1993 to 1994, he worked in the Japan unit of the European Commission. He speaks Japanese, Chinese, French and German.

Before joining the MDM Bank Board of Directors in 2007, Oleg headed the Federal Financial Markets Service of the Russian Federation, a position he had held since 2004.Between 1999 and 2002 he was Executive Vice-President at Troika Dialog, Russia’s oldest investment company. Oleg has also held a variety of senior positions within the Russian government, including First Deputy Minister of Finance, First Deputy Chairman of the Central Bank of Russia, and extraordinary advisor to the Prime Minister of the Russian Federation.After graduating from the department of mechanics and mathematics at Moscow State University in 1974, Oleg successfully defended his PhD in physics and mathematics at the same university in 1977.

Sri Mulyani Indrawati is responsible for all of the World Bank's operations. She joined the World Bank in June 2010. Previously she was Indonesia’s Minister of Finance, in addition to being the coordinating Minister of Economic Affairs. In these roles she guided economic policy, navigating successfully the global economic crisis, implementing key reforms, and fighting corruption. She is credited with helping Indonesia through the challenging transition from autocracy to democracy. Ms. Indrawati led the Indonesian National Development Planning Agency prior to her position as Finance Minister. She also coordinated the government's and international reconstruction efforts following the 2004 tsunami. Her earlier positions include ED at the IMF, faculty member at the University of Indonesia and Visiting Professor at Georgia State University. Ms. Indrawati holds a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Illinois and a B.A. in Economics from the University of Indonesia. She is regularly in the Forbes List of 100 Most Powerful Women in the World. Ms. Indrawati is married with three children.

Alexey Kudrin is currently Dean of School of Liberal Arts and Sciences of St. Petersburg State University. Since May 2000 till September 2011 he served as Finance Minister of Russia. His financial policies received international recognition; he was named "Finance Minister of the Year 2004" by The Banker magazine and "Finance Minister of the Year 2010" by Euromoney magazine. In years 2000-2003 and 2008-2011 Alexei Kudrin also held the post of Deputy Prime-Minister. In 2005 he was awarded the Order of Merit for the Fatherland.Before joining the government, Alexei Kudrin worked for Saint-Petersburg City government, holding positions of Deputy Mayor of St. Petersburg and Chairman of the Committee for Economy and Finances.Alexei Kudrin has academic degree of Candidate of Economic Sciences (PhD in Economics). He is professor, author of more than 30 research papers and articles on economics and finance, delivering lectures in many universities and colleges around the globe and providing his expertise to the government of Russia.

Mr. David Lipton assumed the position of First Deputy Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund on September 1, 2011. Prior to this, he was Special Advisor to the Managing Director of the IMF starting July 26, 2011. Before joining the Fund, he was Special Assistant to the President, and served as Senior Director for International Economic Affairs at the National Economic Council and National Security Council at the White House. Previously, Mr. Lipton was a Managing Director at Citi. Prior to joining Citi in May 2005, he was at Moore Capital Management for five years and, before that spent a year at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Mr. Lipton served in the Clinton administration at the Treasury Department from 1993 to 1998, including as Assistant Secretary and Under Secretary of the Treasury for International Affairs. Before that, he was a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center of Scholars. From 1989 to 1992, he along with Prof. Jeffrey Sachs worked as economic advisers to the governments of Russia, Poland and Slovenia. Mr. Lipton began his career with eight years on the IMF staff. He has a Ph.D. and M.A. from Harvard University in 1982 and a B.A. from Wesleyan University in 1975.

Lord (Peter) Mandelson, born in 1953, is a former European Trade Commissioner and British First Secretary of State. As EU Trade Commissioner between 2004 and 2008, he negotiated trade agreements with many countries and led European negotiations in the WTO Doha World Trade Round. He was Minister without Portfolio, Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, Northern Ireland Secretary and Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills in the British government under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown between 1997 and 2010. He was Member of Parliament for Hartlepool in the UK from 1992 until 2004 and Director of Campaigns and Communications for the Labour party between 1985 and 1990. He is also President of the Policy Network think tank, senior advisor to Lazard and non-executive director of AFK Sistema.

Mark Haefele joined UBS as Head of Investment for Wealth Management in March 2011. Starting in 1999, he has been a general partner and co-portfolio manager of a Boston-based hedge fund The Sonic Funds of which he was also a co-founder. He focused on using bottom-up research to locate misvalued stocks and building a long-short equity portfolio. Since 2002, he has been acting as an outside contributor for Street.com, financial publication. Before joining Matrix Capital Management LLC where he was as a managing director from 2005 until 2007, Haefele was a lecturer at the History Department of Harvard University. Haefele holds a bachelor's degree from Princeton University (1993), a master's degree from the Australian National University (1996) and master's (1997) and Ph.D. (2000) degrees from Harvard University.

Tharman is Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Finance in Singapore. He currently serves also as Minister for Manpower. He was appointed Chairman of the International Monetary and Financial Committee (IMFC), the policy steering committee of the IMF, in March 2011. He was also admitted to the Group of Thirty, also known as "The Consultative Group on International Economic and Monetary Affairs", in June 2008. He is also Chairman of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), Singapore’s central bank and integrated financial regulator, where he was chief executive before his entry to politics in 2001, and had spent much of his earlier professional life. Since 2001, he has served in various appointments, including five years as Minister for Education. Tharman did his undergraduate and masters education in Economics at the London School of Economics and Cambridge University. He later obtained a masters in Public Administration at Harvard University, where he received the Lucius N Littauer Fellow award for outstanding performance and leadership potential.

Ms. Hu Shuli is Editor-in-Chief of Caixin Media, and the Dean of the School of Communication and Design at Sun Yat-sen University. Ms. Hu was awarded the 2012 Missouri Honor Medal for Distinguished Service in Journalism. Internationally recognized for her achievements in journalism, she was listed among Top 100 Influential People of 2011 by Time magazine. She was twice named one of Top 100 Global Thinkers by Foreign Policy magazine in 2009 and 2010. The Caixin editorial team under her leadership won the 2011 Shorenstein Journalism Award from Stanford University. Ms. Hu also serves on the board of directors for the International Women’s Media Foundation and is a member of the Reuters Editorial Advisory Board. She is a member of the International Media Council of the World Economic Forum, and a regional advisor for the International Center for Journalists.