Dr Nasser H. Saidi is the Founder and President of Nasser Saidi & Associates and acts as adviser to governments, central banks and regulators. He is adviser and board member to multi-national and regional companies. He is Deputy Chairman of Eureeca Capital, a crowd-investing platform. He is the former Chief Economist of the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) from 2006 to September 2012, where as an executive he helped build & promote the centre and its strategic development and developed the links with governments, central banks, international organisations, international banks & financial institutions and international financial centres. Dr Saidi is the Founder and former Executive Director of the Hawkamah- Institute for Corporate Governance and the Mudara Institute of Directors, 2006-2012.
Dr Saidi is Chairman of the regional Clean Energy Business Council, promoting clean energy solutions and policies in the MENA countries. He is a member of the IMF’s Regional Advisory Group for MENA and Co-Chair of the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development’s (OECD) MENA Corporate Governance Working Group. He is a Member of the Advisory Board of the Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum (OMFIF) and a member of the Private Sector Advisory Group of the Global Corporate Governance Forum, an institution of the World Bank driving global corporate governance reforms.
In 2013, he was named among the 50 most I nfluential Arabs in the World by The Middle East magazine, for the fourth consecutive year and named among the 500 Most Powerful Arabs in the world by Arabian Business for the second consecutive year.
Dr Saidi was the Minister of Economy and Trade and Minister of Industry of Lebanon between 1998 and 2000. He was the F irst Vice-Governor of the Central Bank of Lebanon for two successive mandates, 1993-1998 and 1998-2003. He was a Member of the UN Committee for Development Policy (UNCDP) for two mandates over the period 2000-2006, a position to which he was appointed by former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, in his personal capacity.
He the author of numerous articles and has written a number of books and publications addressing macroeconomic, capital market development and international economic issues in the MENA region, the GCC countries and Lebanon. His research interests include macroeconomics, financial market development, payment systems and international economic policy, corporate governance, clean energy and information and communication technology (ICT).
Dr Saidi was a private banker and served as an economic adviser and director to a number of central banks and financial institutions in Arab countries, Europe and Central and Latin America.
Prior to his public career, Dr Saidi pursued a career as an academic, serving as a Professor of Economics at the Department of Economics in the University of Chicago, the Institut Universitaire de Hautes Etudes Internationales (Geneva, CH), and the Université de Genève. He also served as a lecturer at the American University of Beirut and the Université St. Joseph in Beirut.
Dr Saidi holds a Ph.D. and a M.A. in Economics from the University of Rochester in the USA, a M.Sc. from University College, London University and a B.A. from the American University of Beirut.
