Chris Canavan is CEO of the Global Carbon Market Utility (GCMU), which is building much needed financial infrastructure to scale the carbon markets to have climate impact.

Over four decades, Chris has been an economist and advisor on international economic and financial matters. He was a partner at Lion’s Head Global Partners (now Cygnum Capital), a financial advisory and asset management firm focused on sustainable finance in emerging and frontier markets. Before that, Chris spent a decade as Director of Global Policy Development for George Soros, where he led projects related to mission investing, financial policy reform, sustainable development, climate change, and resource governance. Between 1997 and 2010, Chris worked for Goldman Sachs in several capacities, including Chief Risk Officer of the firm’s commercial bank, credit trader in the global commodities business, co-head of Latin America Debt Capital Markets, and head of Latin America credit and sovereign risk management. From 1993 to 1997, Chris taught economics at Boston College. He has also taught at Columbia University and New York University.

Chris served as the chair of the Board of Trustees of Oberlin College. He has also served as Chair of the Board of the Fund for Global Human Rights and of the Institute for New Economic Thinking. He was a member of the advisory board of the Munk School of Global Affairs at the University of Toronto. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. For eight years, Chris wrote a weekly column in El Diario/La Prensa, New York’s largest Spanish language newspaper.

Chris received his PhD in Economics from Columbia University, an MIA from Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs, and a BA from Oberlin College.