Current roles & some examples of his expertise

Currently Gerard holds a portfolio of roles, including:

• Chief Economic Strategist and shareholder at Netwealth, the award winning challenger wealth manager
• Board Member – Bank of China (UK)
• Board Member – BGC Brokers, the world’s largest inter-deal brokers
• Advisory Board – Grantham Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School Economics and Imperial College London
• Research Fellow – Centre for Policy Studies, the influential centre-right UK think-tank
• Advisory Council – Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum
• Member – The UK’s Economic Honours Committee

Gerard has spent over 30 years in senior roles in the City and public policy. From 1999-2012, he was Chief Economist, Global Head of Research and Advisor to the Board at Standard Chartered Bank. He ran a global team of 184 people and was a member of the Bank’s senior management team, sitting on its Wholesale Markets Management team, Risk Management committee and Executive Forum. In both 2010 and 2011, Bloomberg ranked his team as the most accurate economic forecasters globally.

Before this, in 2008 a month before Lehman Brothers collapsed, Gerard was one of just two UK economists predicting a deep imminent recession. On leaving Standard Chartered The Times ran a piece entitled: “Where next for the economist who called the global downturn?”

From 1989-1999, Gerard was Chief Economist and Executive Director at Dai-Ichi Kangyo Bank International – then the world’s biggest bank. While there, he predicted Japan’s lost economic decades and had a regular column in the Nikkei. Prior to this, he was Chief UK Economist at Swiss Bank Corporation before beginning his career with Chase Manhattan.

Gerard has made many high-profile and non-consensus accurate economic predictions. In addition to predicting Japan’s lost decades, a deep imminent recession in 2008,  he also predicted that the Lawson Boom would end in a bust, argued for the economic benefits of leaving the European Rate Mechanism and, to quote The Guardian, “predicted trouble for the Euro way back in 1999.”

Alongside his excellent forecasting record, Gerard’s analysis of the UK and global economy – particularly emerging markets –  has regularly been sought by policymakers, including politicians and central bankers both at home and abroad. He has spoken in 82 countries, testified to committees of the US Congress and Senate on the rise of ‘State Capitalism’, to committees in both the UK’s House of Commons and Lords and his paper ‘Banking the Unbanked’ was presented at the Commonwealth Finance Ministers Conference in 2005.

As well as his City career, Gerard has played an important role in public policy. In 2008, he was the Lead Advisor on the Business Council for Britain set up by then Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Between 2008-2016, he was a member of the International Council of The Bretton Woods Committee. Between 2009-2014, he sat on several Councils and was on the Expert Committee of the World Economic Forum.

In 2011, he was an inaugural member of the EU Commission’s Network of China Experts.  Meanwhile from 2012-2016, he was Boris Johnson’s Chief Economic Advisor when he was Mayor of London. In the latter role, he championed London globally and was a key driver of delivering the London Living Wage. During this time, he also wrote his first book ‘The Consolations of Economics’ published by Faber & Faber. It was translated into five languages and was nominated as one of The Telegraph’s ‘Books of the Year’.

In 2019, he was a candidate to be Governor of the Bank of England.

Gerard is also widely recognised as an impressive public speaker. He has spoken on panels at the International Monetary Fund, Institute of International Finance, World Economic Forum, Asian Development Bank among other international fora. In 2005, he spoke in Beijing’s Great Hall of People at the EU-China Summit. At the height of the financial crisis, he was asked by the Institute of International Finance to represent the financial sector in ‘The World Debate’ at the 2010 World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, which was televised live globally by the BBC. Meanwhile, in 2018 he gave a keynote speech at the inaugural Shanghai Import-Export. These are just some of Gerard’s many high-profile speaking engagements.

His contribution to economics has been recognised by his peers. In 2010 he was elected by the economic members to serve a five-year term on the Council of the Royal Economic Society, and he also joined the strategy group. Additionally, in 2011 he was made a Fellow of the Society of Professional Economists.

Gerard and his daughter, the comedian Elf Lyons, have recently started the second series of their economics podcast – Elfonomics.