IMF Conference

S. Ali Abbas is a deputy director in the IMF’s Fiscal Affairs Department where he supervises the sovereign debt and governance workstreams, and oversees the department’s review of Fund programs in emerging and developing economies, with a focus on Sub-Saharan Africa. He was previously IMF mission chief for the United Kingdom and Jordan, and deputy chief of the Debt Policy Division in the IMF’s Strategy Policy and Review Department. He has been closely involved in several complex Fund programs, and has led reforms to the IMF’s exceptional access lending and debt sustainability frameworks. In 2019, he co-edited Sovereign Debt: A Guide for Economists and Practitioners (OUP), with Alex Pienkowski and Kenneth Rogoff, adding to his earlier published work on post-GFC fiscal policy, the euro area sovereign debt crisis, international tax competition, state contingent debt instruments, fiscal policy and the current account, and government securities markets. Ali is a Rhodes scholar from Pakistan and holds a doctorate in economics from Oxford. He also served as an Overseas Development Institute fellow to the Tanzanian Treasury during 2000–02.

Carlo Cottarelli, a citizen of Italy, after receiving degrees in economics from the University of Siena and the London School of Economics, worked at the Bank of Italy, ENI and the IMF. He was FAD Director in 2008-13, Commissioner for Public Spending in Italy in 2013-14, IMF Executive Director in 2014-17. He taught at Bocconi University and he is currently Director of the Observatory on the Italian Public Accounts of the Catholic University of Milan, where he also teaches a course of Fiscal Macroeconomics In 2021 he was awarded the honor of First Class Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic.

Christoph Trebesch is a professor at the Kiel Institute for the World Economy and the University of Kiel. His research focuses on international finance and macroeconomics as well as political economy and geopolitics. His research has been published in leading economic journals such as the American Economic Review, the Quarterly Journal of Economics, and the Journal of Political Economy, and is regularly cited in international media, including the New York Times, the Financial Times, and the Wall Street Journal. He directs the CEPR Policy Network on "International Lending and Sovereign Debt" and co-directs the CEPR Network on "Geoeconomics", for which he organizes an annual high-level conference on geopolitics and economics. He is also the creator of the widely referenced "Ukraine Support Tracker" on military and financial aid flows to Ukraine. In 2023, he was awarded an ERC Consolidator Grant, one of the most prestigious research recognitions in Europe.

Katherine Baer is a Deputy Director in the IMF’s Fiscal Affairs Department (FAD). She oversees FAD’s work in the areas of taxation and public financial management, supervises Capacity Development (CD) delivery in all fiscal areas to countries in the Middle East, North Africa and Centra Asia, oversees FAD’s strategy to strengthen fiscal policies and institutions in the Fragile and Conflict-Affected States, and manages the department’s work on fiscal issues from a gender perspective. Her career at the IMF has focused on strengthening fiscal policies and institutions in member countries across all regions and income levels, and in countries experiencing economic crises. She has been an economist in the U.S. Treasury and an assistant commissioner in the Mexican Tax Administration. She also worked at the World Bank on public finance reforms in Latin America and the Caribbean at the height of the region’s debt crisis in the 1980s. Ms. Baer has many publications relating to public finance and holds a Ph.D. from Cornell University.

Juan Toro is Deputy Director of the IMF’s Fiscal Affairs Department (FAD), in charge of: managing FAD budget, relationship with development partners, overseeing governance and operations of FAD’s capacity development (CD), coordinating FAD’s CD to Europe, and coordinating FAD TA on sustainable development goals. He previously was Assistant Director in charge of the IMF’s revenue administration CD to Europe, Asia, Middle East, and Central Asia.

He has led and participated in IMF TA missions in taxation in more than 40 countries and has authored and contributed to several analytical papers in taxation. Before joining the IMF in 2007, he was the Commissioner of the Chilean Tax Administration (Servicio de Impuestos Internos, SII) from 2002 to 2006.

Alternate Executive Director from Nigeria from July 2023 to October 2024. A Nigerian national representing - Angola, Nigeria, and South Africa (EDS25). Prior to joining the WBG, Ms. Ahmed has served a:- Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning (2018- 2023); Minister of State, Ministry of Budget and National Planning (2015 – 2018); Chair of the board of Trustees of the African Union Peace Fund (2019 – 2023). Member of the International Board, Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) (2016 – 2019); Executive Secretary and National Coordinator, Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI) (2010 – 2015); and Managing Director, Kaduna Investment Company Ltd (2009 – 2010).

Dr. Abdulelah AlRasheedy is the Deputy Minister for Macro-Fiscal Policies at Ministry of Finance (MOF). Before being named Deputy Minister in March 2024, Dr. AlRasheedy was Assistant Deputy Minister for Macroeconomic Policies Analysis and Acting as General Supervisor of Policy and Consultation Assistant Deputyship.
Prior to joining Ministry of Finance, Dr. Abdulelah spent 12 years with Saudi Central Bank (SAMA) most recently as Manager of Economic Modeling Division and was SAMA Representative at The International Financial Architecture Working Group.
Dr. Abdulelah earned a Ph.D.  in economics and statistics from University of Missouri, where he was a Research Scholar at the Global Institute for Sustainable Prosperity.
In addition to being a Deputy Minister, he is a board member of King Abdullah City for Atomic and Renewable Energy. Also a Ministry of Finance Representative for Financial Sustainability Board. 

Adam S. Posen is president of the Peterson Institute for International Economics. He has contributed to research and public policy on G20 monetary and fiscal policies, European economic integration since the euro, the effectiveness of fiscal stimulus in Japan’s recovery from its Great Recession, and recently on the role of macroeconomic policy in reaching The Green Frontier.  From 2009 to 2012, Posen served as an external voting member of the Bank of England's rate-setting Monetary Policy Committee (MPC).  He served seven terms on the Panel of Economic Advisors to the U.S. Congressional Budget Office. He is an inaugural CEPR Distinguished Fellow. He received his BA and PhD from Harvard University. 

Mark Sobel is currently US Chair at OMFIF.  He served  nearly four decades at the US Treasury, including as Deputy Assistant Secretary for International and Monetary Affairs from 2000-2015, a position in which he led the Department's work in preparing G7 and G20 Finance Minister and Central Bank Governor meetings, formulating US positions in the IMF, and coordinating the work of Treasury and regulatory agencies in the Financial Stability Board.  He was also chief US financial negotiator in the G20 from 2008-2015, including for the 2009 London Economic Summit.  From 2015 through early 2018, he was US representative at the IMF. 

Simon Johnson is the Ronald A. Kurtz (1954) Professor of Entrepreneurship the MIT Sloan School of Management, where he is head of the Global Economics and Management group. At MIT, he is also co-director of the Shaping the Future of Work Initiative and a Research Affiliate at Blueprint Labs. In 2007-08, Johnson was chief economist and director of the Research Department at the International Monetary Fund. He currently co-chairs the CFA Institute Systemic Risk Council with Erkki Liikanen. In February 2021, Johnson joined the board of directors of Fannie Mae, where he is vice chair of the audit committee and a member of the risk and capital committee. Johnson’s most recent book, with Daron Acemoglu, Power and Progress: Our 1000-Year Struggle Over Technology and Prosperity, explores the history and economics of major technological transformations up to and including the latest developments in Artificial Intelligence.
2024 Nobel prize laureate in economic sciences “for studies of how institutions are formed and affect prosperity”

Research professor at the Graduate Center, City University of New York and senior scholar at The Stone Center on Socio-economic Inequality; Visiting Professor at the Institute for International Inequalities at LSE; was lead economist in World Bank Research Department for almost 20 years and senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington. Milanovic’s main area of work is income inequality, in individual countries and globally, as well as historically among pre-industrial societies. His most recent books are Global inequality: a new approach for the age of globalization which deals with economic and political issues of globalization, and Capitalism, Alone that contrasts inequality and class formation in societies of liberal and political capitalism. In October 2023, he published Visions of Inequality that looks at how income distribution was studied by the most famous economists over the past 200 years. Milanovic was awarded (jointly with Mariana Mazzucato) the 2018 Leontieff Prize.

Jason Furman is the Aetna Professor of the Practice of Economic Policy jointly at Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) and the Department of Economics at Harvard University. Furman engages in public policy through research, writing and teaching in a wide range of areas including U.S. and international macroeconomics, fiscal policy, labor markets and competition policy. Previously Furman served eight years as a top economic adviser to President Obama, including serving as the 28th Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers from August 2013 to January 2017, acting as both President Obama’s chief economist and a member of the cabinet. In addition to articles in scholarly journals and periodicals, Furman is a regular contributor to the Wall Street Journal and Project Syndicate and the editor of two books on economic policy. Furman holds a Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University.

He was elected president of the IDB in November 2022, after serving as director of the Western Hemisphere Department at the International Monetary Fund. Previously, he was governor of the Banco Central do Brasil (2016-2019), where he led several modernization reforms, including promoting financial inclusion through Brazil’s fast digital payment system. He has also held several academic positions and high-ranking roles in Brazil’s financial sector.  In 2017, he was elected Central Banker of the Year by The Banker magazine.  Mr. Goldfajn holds a doctorate in economics from MIT, and master’s degree in economics from the Pontificia Universidade and has taught economics at universities in Brazil and the U.S. He is fluent in four languages.

Michael Keen was formerly Deputy Director of the Fiscal Affairs Department at the International Monetary Fund. He is now Ushioda Fellow at the University of Tokyo. Michael was President of the International Institute of Public Finance from 2003 to 2006, awarded the CESifo Musgrave Prize in 2010, and in 2018 received from the National Tax Association of the United States its most prestigious award, the Daniel M. Holland Medal for distinguished lifetime contributions to the study and practice of public finance. His most recent book, Rebellion, Rascals and Revenues (with Joel Slemrod), aims to use history and humor to convey basic tax principles to a wider audience.