Robertson, Charles: Renaissance Capital’s Global Chief Economist

Charles, a leading emerging markets specialist, is Renaissance Capital’s Global Chief Economist and head of the Firm’s macro-strategy unit. He covers global economic themes and their impact on emerging markets.

Over the past decade, the scope of Charles’s work has covered, among other topics: quantifying political risk in emerging markets; how rising retirement ages reflect deep-rooted problems in the West and great opportunities in emerging markets; the revolutionary nature of growth in countries with non-democratic governments; the fact that Africa’s economies are now returning some of the highest growth rates on Earth, and how this trend is set to play out; the impact of terrorism and natural disasters on economies; the effects of falling agricultural stocks on food prices and inflation; and how emerging-market banks may have the best growth potential over the coming years.

He is the lead author of The Fastest Billion: The Story Behind Africa’s Economic Revolution (www.fastestbillion.com), published in October 2012.

Charles was ranked the number-one economics and macro analyst for emerging Europe, the Middle East and Africa in the Extel survey in 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010. In addition, his team was ranked the best macro team in Extel’s 2010 survey of equity investors, and number one for SSA in the 2012 Institutional Investor survey.

He graduated from the London School of Economics in 1993, and worked at a UK parliamentary defence think-tank and a research boutique before joining the financial services industry in 1998.