Associate Economist/Economist

Contract

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Associate Economist/Economist

Description

IFC—a member of the World Bank Group—is the largest global development institution focused on the private sector in emerging markets. We work in more than 100 countries, using our capital, expertise, and influence to create markets and opportunities in developing countries. In fiscal year 2022, IFC committed a record $32.8 billion to private companies and financial institutions in developing countries, leveraging the power of the private sector to end extreme poverty and boost shared prosperity as economies grapple with the impacts of global compounding crises. For more information, visit www.ifc.org

The IFC Macro and Market Research Department (CGRDR) reporting to both Economics and Private Sector Development VPU and Portfolio VPU, is a unique research team in charge of generating thorough analyses of countries and market’s dynamics to identify strategic implications for IFC business and IFC investment clients. The unit caters strategic and proprietary research to IFC Senior Management, respective reporting VPUs, IFC investment departments and existing or potential investment clients of IFC. It combines in-house expertise in macroeconomics, financial markets analysis, portfolio, policy and development trends. The team leverages IFC operational and industry knowledge and WBG macro and sector expertise to provide a comprehensive view of global and country-specific industry trends and investment opportunities. The unit’s output includes: (1) global and regional outlooks on macro and market trends as well as their drivers to inform business and portfolio decisions, (2) country-risk ratings based on macro-economic, market and political developments and other credit monitoring tools such as BICRA and CICRA, (3) strategic asset allocation framework and recommendations, (4) in-house macroeconomic models such as the Medium Term Vulnerability Model and FX Models, (5) market research tools that support investment decisions, such as equity and FX valuation, commodity prices analyzes, capital flows, trade and debt monitoring, for sourcing, valuing and managing IFC investments, (6) applied fundamental research such as productivity, demographics and urbanization, and (7) industry research products such as valuation by sector, household surveys forecast, corporate, banking vulnerability and in-depth industry analysis.

We are seeking an Associate Economist/Economist to focus on real sector regulatory issues and opportunity mapping, especially around climate finance, as macro analysis in selected countries, with the ability to contribute to CGR’s country risk function.

Role & Responsibilities:

Responsibilities include, but are not limited to:

Climate-Focused Real Sector Work

• Be a leading member of a team supporting operations in the identification of opportunities, strategy development and business development for climate-focused real sector lending and investing. • Support the team through delivery of bespoke sector level research on manufacturing, agriculture and services in EMDEs, contributing to the analysis of sector potential across countries and within specific countries as needed in order to support Mainstream and Upstream/Advisory investment teams at the global and region levels. • Broad familiarity with and interest in climate-related development issues, including adaptation and mitigation and the World Bank’s Country Climate Development Reports. • Broad understanding of decarbonization trends and technologies and climate-related regulation and incentives. • Strong data analytics and econometric skills to be able to build demand scenarios for different goods that are relevant to the energy transition (i.e recycled materials, construction materials, electric vehicles, etc). • Have a good understanding of the drivers of competitiveness in green real sectors such as green steel, cement, aluminum, among others. • Have a good understanding of green technology value chains. • Use Harvard Growth Lab’s complexity framework to assess and rank sector opportunities, analyzing a country’s potential to move into different economic activities, or scale up sectors where a competitive advantage could be developed. • Analyze different green value chains and identify opportunities for countries, both at a regional and global level, to enter or expand across different links based on existing capabilities and capabilities that can be developed in the absence of specific constraints. • Develop tools that facilitate cross country assessment of climate investment opportunities. • Interact with WB colleagues focused on energy sector and other regulations relevant to climate-investments in selected countries and with IFC colleagues from investment teams on priority sectors and IFC debt and equity products where opportunities exist.

Macro Analysis

• Closely monitor a select number of high exposure countries in a selected region, and evaluate their macroeconomic, sector, and market trends and developments for the region including projections of long-term growth in real GDP and sectors, integrating assessments of relative valuation, banking sector capital adequacy and capital market development potential. • Contribute to CGR’s work on long-term FX projections, integrating more fully with EBA-style assessments and IMF estimates of real effective exchange rate equilibria. • Contribute to CGR’s work compiling high frequency data in particular private debt in EMDEs by sector where available and analyzing financing needs of IFC client countries, identify countries and sectors that may trigger macroeconomic risks for IFC operations. • Carry operationally relevant fundamental research including as examples long-term in-house FX projections, country specific scenario analysis, FDI inflow projections and demand drivers for certain sectors and projection of bank liquidity and capital needs • Author IRM country notes, country and regional presentations for senior management and portfolio reviews and others as well as other macroeconomic analyses (Watch This Space, regional portfolio country presentations) that inform risks and opportunities for the private sector for both internal and external clients, linking macro outlooks and risks to projects for investment teams, sector economists and portfolio officers.

Country Risk

• Be a member of CGR’s Country Risk Team, which manages and works on improving the process of IFC’s country risk function. Support the team’s review, approval and risk rating tracking and documentation of BICRA/CICRA changes, which are critical for internal and external auditors • Incorporate the country risk reviews to derive the BICRA/CICRA economic/country risk scores for 188 countries, which are key inputs to IFC’s IRP platform that Credit Risk uses to evaluate project risk ratings • Help monitor the development of foreign currency sovereign risk ratings in order to develop an in-house view, including those countries that are not covered by the rating agencies • Serve as one of the key contacts to communicate with colleagues inside and outside of CGR on the country risk process and methodology, including any issues that arise on BICRA/CICRA economic and country risk scores.

IFC—a member of the World Bank Group—is the largest global development institution focused on the private sector in emerging markets. We work in more than 100 countries, using our capital, expertise, and influence to create markets and opportunities in developing countries. In fiscal year 2022, IFC committed a record $32.8 billion to private companies and financial institutions in developing countries, leveraging the power of the private sector to end extreme poverty and boost shared prosperity as economies grapple with the impacts of global compounding crises. For more information, visit www.ifc.org

The IFC Macro and Market Research Department (CGRDR) reporting to both Economics and Private Sector Development VPU and Portfolio VPU, is a unique research team in charge of generating thorough analyses of countries and market’s dynamics to identify strategic implications for IFC business and IFC investment clients. The unit caters strategic and proprietary research to IFC Senior Management, respective reporting VPUs, IFC investment departments and existing or potential investment clients of IFC. It combines in-house expertise in macroeconomics, financial markets analysis, portfolio, policy and development trends. The team leverages IFC operational and industry knowledge and WBG macro and sector expertise to provide a comprehensive view of global and country-specific industry trends and investment opportunities. The unit’s output includes: (1) global and regional outlooks on macro and market trends as well as their drivers to inform business and portfolio decisions, (2) country-risk ratings based on macro-economic, market and political developments and other credit monitoring tools such as BICRA and CICRA, (3) strategic asset allocation framework and recommendations, (4) in-house macroeconomic models such as the Medium Term Vulnerability Model and FX Models, (5) market research tools that support investment decisions, such as equity and FX valuation, commodity prices analyzes, capital flows, trade and debt monitoring, for sourcing, valuing and managing IFC investments, (6) applied fundamental research such as productivity, demographics and urbanization, and (7) industry research products such as valuation by sector, household surveys forecast, corporate, banking vulnerability and in-depth industry analysis.

We are seeking an Associate Economist/Economist to focus on real sector regulatory issues and opportunity mapping, especially around climate finance, as macro analysis in selected countries, with the ability to contribute to CGR’s country risk function.

Role & Responsibilities:

Responsibilities include, but are not limited to:

Climate-Focused Real Sector Work

• Be a leading member of a team supporting operations in the identification of opportunities, strategy development and business development for climate-focused real sector lending and investing. • Support the team through delivery of bespoke sector level research on manufacturing, agriculture and services in EMDEs, contributing to the analysis of sector potential across countries and within specific countries as needed in order to support Mainstream and Upstream/Advisory investment teams at the global and region levels. • Broad familiarity with and interest in climate-related development issues, including adaptation and mitigation and the World Bank’s Country Climate Development Reports. • Broad understanding of decarbonization trends and technologies and climate-related regulation and incentives. • Strong data analytics and econometric skills to be able to build demand scenarios for different goods that are relevant to the energy transition (i.e recycled materials, construction materials, electric vehicles, etc). • Have a good understanding of the drivers of competitiveness in green real sectors such as green steel, cement, aluminum, among others. • Have a good understanding of green technology value chains. • Use Harvard Growth Lab’s complexity framework to assess and rank sector opportunities, analyzing a country’s potential to move into different economic activities, or scale up sectors where a competitive advantage could be developed. • Analyze different green value chains and identify opportunities for countries, both at a regional and global level, to enter or expand across different links based on existing capabilities and capabilities that can be developed in the absence of specific constraints. • Develop tools that facilitate cross country assessment of climate investment opportunities. • Interact with WB colleagues focused on energy sector and other regulations relevant to climate-investments in selected countries and with IFC colleagues from investment teams on priority sectors and IFC debt and equity products where opportunities exist.

Macro Analysis

• Closely monitor a select number of high exposure countries in a selected region, and evaluate their macroeconomic, sector, and market trends and developments for the region including projections of long-term growth in real GDP and sectors, integrating assessments of relative valuation, banking sector capital adequacy and capital market development potential. • Contribute to CGR’s work on long-term FX projections, integrating more fully with EBA-style assessments and IMF estimates of real effective exchange rate equilibria. • Contribute to CGR’s work compiling high frequency data in particular private debt in EMDEs by sector where available and analyzing financing needs of IFC client countries, identify countries and sectors that may trigger macroeconomic risks for IFC operations. • Carry operationally relevant fundamental research including as examples long-term in-house FX projections, country specific scenario analysis, FDI inflow projections and demand drivers for certain sectors and projection of bank liquidity and capital needs • Author IRM country notes, country and regional presentations for senior management and portfolio reviews and others as well as other macroeconomic analyses (Watch This Space, regional portfolio country presentations) that inform risks and opportunities for the private sector for both internal and external clients, linking macro outlooks and risks to projects for investment teams, sector economists and portfolio officers.

Country Risk

• Be a member of CGR’s Country Risk Team, which manages and works on improving the process of IFC’s country risk function. Support the team’s review, approval and risk rating tracking and documentation of BICRA/CICRA changes, which are critical for internal and external auditors • Incorporate the country risk reviews to derive the BICRA/CICRA economic/country risk scores for 188 countries, which are key inputs to IFC’s IRP platform that Credit Risk uses to evaluate project risk ratings • Help monitor the development of foreign currency sovereign risk ratings in order to develop an in-house view, including those countries that are not covered by the rating agencies • Serve as one of the key contacts to communicate with colleagues inside and outside of CGR on the country risk process and methodology, including any issues that arise on BICRA/CICRA economic and country risk scores.

Selection Criteria

• Advanced degree in economics with specialization in macroeconomics, international and development economics, country risk, financial economics. • 5-8 years of professional experience in a research or analytical role focused on international economics, country risk, debt and development policy related issues. Experience in a research or analytical role focused on sector analytics and development policy related issues and/or experience in economic consulting would be desirable. • Strong understanding of the private sector, demand and supply trends and determinants and policy impact on sector performance. • Broad knowledge and understanding of linkages between major sectors of the economy and private sector dynamics, including the key drivers of growth in EMs and advanced economics • Good understanding of macrofinancial linkages, regulations and supervisory issues. • Demonstrated written and verbal communications skills in English delivering macroeconomic and financial analysis and assessments; able to convey complex concepts and distill analysis to clear, concise messages. • Ability to combine theoretical frameworks with applied research. Strong understanding of the economics of development, the challenges developing countries face and the role of the private sector. • Broad knowledge and understanding of linkages between major sectors of the economy, especially the financial sector, and private sector dynamics, including the key drivers of growth in EMs and advanced economics. • Experience on country-level analysis covering macroeconomics, industry and market trends. • Experience in country and regional macroeconomic analysis. Knowledge of Latin America or another key region would be a plus. • Ability to work well within a multicultural team context, building on the synergies of different team members and their expertise, seeking opportunities to advance the financial and development objectives of the department and IFC, while respecting cultural differences. • Extensive experience and knowledge of Microsoft Excel, econometric packages, and presentation packages. • Ability to thrive under pressure and function effectively while managing multiple tasks simultaneously • High level of attention to detail and capacity to deliver high quality work, often against tight deadlines. • Able to coach and provide guidance and training to junior members of the team. • A strong team player.

World Bank Group Core Competencies

The World Bank Group offers comprehensive benefits, including a retirement plan; medical, life and disability insurance; and paid leave, including parental leave, as well as reasonable accommodations for individuals with disabilities.

We are proud to be an equal opportunity and inclusive employer with a dedicated and committed workforce, and do not discriminate based on gender, gender identity, religion, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or disability.

Learn more about working at the World Bank and IFC, including our values and inspiring stories.