The international monetary system has proven remarkably resilient, yet it is also facing a period of renewed scrutiny as inflation dynamics, geopolitical fragmentation, and shifting policy frameworks test some of its underlying assumptions. Against this backdrop, our event, drawing on history and market experience, will explore how the system may evolve in the years ahead — including whether alternative anchors (such as a modern interpretation of the gold standard?) merit reconsideration.

Russell Napier is an investment strategist and author of “The Solid Ground” report, with 36 years’ experience advising global institutional investors on asset allocation since 1995. He wrote “Anatomy of the Bear”—a long-standing “cult classic”—and “The Asian Financial Crisis 1995–1998: Birth of the Age of Debt (2021)”, and founded the Practical History of Financial Markets course (running since 2004, now offered in-person and online). He serves on advisory committees for Cerno Capital, Kennox Asset Management, and Bay Capital, and is part owner of Cerno and Kennox. In 2014, he founded The Library of Mistakes, a financial history charity based in Edinburgh with international branches, which also runs lectures and a top-ranked podcast. 

 Dr Felix Martin is an economist, investor, and advisor to government and corporate leaders globally. His thirty-year career in international finance has ranged from sovereign lending and post-conflict reconstruction at the World Bank to designing, launching, and managing a sequence of global investment funds at publicly-listed asset managers, leading private firms, and his own independent boutique. He is a Non-Resident Fellow of the Washington, DC-based Center for Global Development; chairs the independent Cost Benefit Analysis Panel of the UK Financial Conduct Authority; and is a columnist for Reuters Breakingviews. Felix’s 2013 book “Money: the Unauthorised Biography”  has been published in fifteen countries and ten languages, was a Financial Times Economics Book of the Year, and was called “compulsively readable” by the New York Times.

The meeting starts at 5.30pm and will take place at The Royal Airforce Club, 128 Piccadilly, London, W1J 7PY. Doors open at 5.15pm and the debate will be followed by a short networking drinks reception.

Members can register via SPE email communications. Interested in attending but not a member? Visit our member pages to find out how to join Europe’s largest economics professional networks.