Martin Wolf

Martin Wolf’s unique perspective and experience gives him an unparalleled voice on European and global economies. He can speak with authority about the economic relationships underlying our complex financial systems, what we can learn from them, and what lies ahead for Europe, the US, and the rest of the world.

Of Martin, The Times of London recently wrote – The Financial Times’ top columnist is the most important economics commentator in Britain and arguably the world…
Martin is Associate Editor and Chief Economics Commentator at the Financial Times, London. In his regular columns for the FT, he covers a wide range of economically relevant topics. In the recent past, these have included: the state of the global, European and British economies; the “global savings glut” and “secular stagnation”; global monetary policies; the rise of populism; the political economy of Brexit; the future of the eurozone; the future of globalisation; the challenges to the Chinese and Indian economies; the past and future of the global financial system; radical monetary reform; the productivity slowdown and technological change; the economics of migration; the economics of climate change; reform of corporate governance; and the future of universities.
For his “services to financial journalism”, Martin was awarded the CBE (Commander of the British Empire) in 2000.

Martin brings considerable practical experience to his writings. He was a member of the UK government’s Independent Commission on Banking between June 2010 and September 2011. Previously, he was a senior economist for ten years at the World Bank’s division of international trade. He has been a Forum Fellow at the World Economic Forum in Davos since 1999, where he has served as a moderator, and is a member of its International Media Council. He was Director of Studies at the Trade Policy Research Centre, London, and has advised governments and international organizations on trade and economic integration.

Mr. Wolf is the author of highly regarded books on economics and globalisation, Why Globalization Works (Yale University Press), the global financial system, Fixing Global Finance (The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010). Fixing Global Finance describes how the financial crisis developed and what we can do to help ensure future global financial stability. China Business News named Fixing Global Finance its Financial Book of the Year for 2009. In 2015, he wrote about the global financial crisis in The Shifts and the Shocks: What We’ve Learned and Have Still to Learn – from the Financial Crisis (Penguin). His most recent book is ‘The Crisis of Democratic Capitalism” (2023), also published by Penguin.

Martin has won several prestigious awards for his journalism, including the Overseas Press Club of America’s prize for “best commentary on international news in any medium” for 2013; the James Cameron Memorial Award for 2012; a distinguished honorary fellowship by the European International Business Academy in 2012; and the 2012 International Ischia Journalism Prize (Italy’s most prestigious media award).

Other awards include the US Society of Business Writers and Editors 15th Annual Best Business Journalism award, and the “Ludwig-Erhard-Preis für Wirtschaftspublizistik” (“Ludwig Erhard Prize for economic commentary”) from the Ludwig Erhard Stiftung (Foundation) for 2009. He won “Commentariat of the Year 2009” at the Comment Awards, sponsored by Editorial Intelligence, and the Decade of Excellence Award at the 2003 Business Journalists of the Year Awards.

Martin has a well-deserved reputation for rigorous thinking, deep insight, and his incisive and witty delivery.