On behalf of Matterhorn Asset Management, independent German financial journalist Lars Schall talked with renowned fund manager, geopolitical strategist, and bestselling author James G. Rickards. In particular, they discussed the possibility that the Fed has to expand QE; structural changes that need to take place in the US economy; gold’s future role in international trade and finance; the development of physical gold exchanges across Eurasia; and last but not least the guesswork regarding China’s gold reserves.

By Lars Schall

The following podcast was produced and originally published by Matterhorn Asset MGMT in Zurich, Switzerland here.

James G. Rickards, the author of the book “Currency Wars”, is Senior Managing Director of Tangent Capital Partners, a registered broker-dealer and merchant bank, and Senior Managing Director of Omnis, Inc., a research and consulting firm in McLean, Virginia, USA. He is also co-head of Omnis’ practice in Threat Finance & Market Intelligence and a member of the Board of Directors. Moreover, he serves as Principal of Global-I Advisors, LLC, an investment banking firm specializing in the intersection of capital markets and geopolitics. Mr. Rickards is a seasoned counselor, investment banker and risk manager with over thirty-five years experience in capital markets including all aspects of portfolio management, risk management, financing, regulation and operations. 

Mr. Rickards’ career spans the period since 1976 during which he was a first hand participant in the formation and growth of globalized capital markets and complex derivative trading strategies. He has held senior executive positions at sell side firms (Citibank and RBS Greenwich Capital Markets) and buy side firms (Long-Term Capital Management and Caxton Associates) as well as technology firms (OptiMark). He has directly participated in the release of U.S. hostages in Teheran, Iran in 1981 as well as in the 1987 Stock Market Crash and the 1990 collapse of Drexel. He was the principal negotiator of the government-Federal Reserve Bank of New York-sponsored rescue of LTCM in 1998.

Mr. Rickards is a graduate school visiting lecturer at Northwestern University and the School of Advanced International Studies. He has delivered papers on econophysics at the Applied Physics Laboratory and the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Mr. Rickards has written articles published in academic and professional journals in the fields of strategic studies, cognitive diversity, network science and risk management. He is a member of the Business Advisory Board of Shariah Capital, Inc., an advisory firm specializing in Islamic finance and is also a member of the International Business Practices Advisory Panel to the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) Support Group of the Director of National Intelligence. 

Mr. Rickards holds an LL.M. (Taxation) from the New York University School of Law; J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School; M.A. in international economics from the School of Advanced International Studies, Washington DC; and a B.A. degree with honors from the School of Arts & Sciences of The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD.

His advisory clients include private investment funds, investment banks and government directorates. Mr. Rickards is licensed to practice law in New York and New Jersey and various Federal Courts and has held all major financial industry licenses. He has been a frequent speaker at conferences sponsored by bar associations and industry groups in the fields of derivatives and hedge funds and is active in the International Bar Association. He has been interviewed in The Wall Street Journal and on CNBC, Fox, CNN, NPR and C-SPAN and is an OpEd contributor to the New York Times, Financial Times and the Washington Post.

James G. Rickards lives in Connecticut, U.S.A.