Richard C. Koo is the Chief Economist of Nomura Research Institute with responsibilities to provide independent economic and market analysis to Nomura Securities, the leading securities house in Japan, and its clients. Consistently voted as one of the most reliable economists by Japanese capital and financial market participants for nearly a decade, he has also advised successive prime ministers on how best to deal with Japan’s economic and banking problems. He is also the only non-Japanese member of the Defense Strategy Study Conference of the Japan Ministry of Defense. Prior to joining Nomura, he was an economist with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and was a Doctoral Fellow of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. Author of many books and a visiting professor of Waseda University, he was awarded the Abramson Award by the National Association of Business Economics, Washington, D.C. for 2001. His latest book “The Holy Grail of Macroeconomics - Lessons from Japan’s Great Recession” (John Wiley & Sons, 2008) has been translated into and sold in four different languages.