Jens Weidmann (born 20 April 1968 in Solingen) is a German economist and president of the Deutsche Bundesbank. Before assuming the top Bundesbank position in 2011, from February 2006, he served as Head of Division IV (Economic and Financial Policy) in the Federal Chancellery. He was the chief negotiator of the Federal Republic of Germany for both the summits of the G8 and the G20.

In 1987 Weidmann graduated from gymnasium in Backnang, Baden-Württemberg after which he studied economics at Université Paul Cézanne Aix-Marseille III, the University of Paris, and University of Bonn. He received his doctoral degree under the auspices of monetary theorist Manfred J. M. Neumann. During his studies Weidmann had internships at the Banque de France and the National Bank of Rwanda. Due to the resulting knowledge of the French financing sector his later career in German financial politics was welcomed in France and seen as a support of the Franco-German twin engine.

From 1997 to 1999 Weidmann worked at the International Monetary Fund. Until 2004 he worked as Secretary of the German Council of Economic Experts. From there he moved to the Bundesbank, where he was until 2006 the head of the Monetary Policy and Monetary Analysis group. Since 2006 he was responsible for preparing the content and strategy of the G-20 round which was formed to counter the effects of the financial crisis. Chancellor Angela Merkel promoted him in December 2009 to the influential role of the Sherpa of the G8 summits as she considers the G8 round to be only a pre-summit of the G20 round in the field of the world-wide financial system as well as that most other subjects need a wider context than the G8 as well (compare Heiligendamm Process for G8+5).

Paul Robin Krugman ( /ˈkruːɡmən/; born February 28, 1953) is an American economist, Professor of Economics and International Affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University, Centenary Professor at the London School of Economics, and an op-ed columnist for The New York Times. In 2008, Krugman won the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences (informally the Nobel Prize in Economics) for his contributions to New Trade Theory and New Economic Geography. According to the Nobel Prize Committee, the prize was given for Krugman's work explaining the patterns of international trade and the geographic concentration of wealth, by examining the impact of economies of scale and of consumer preferences for diverse goods and services.

Krugman is known in academia for his work on international economics (including trade theory, economic geography, and international finance),liquidity traps and currency crises. He is the 17th most widely cited economist in the world today and is ranked among the most influential academic thinkers in the US.

Nouriel Roubini (born March 29, 1959) is an American economist. He anticipated the collapse of the United States housing market and the worldwide recession which started in 2008. He teaches at New York University's Stern School of Business and is the chairman of Roubini Global Economics, an economic consultancy firm.

The child of Iranian Jews, he grew up in Italy. After receiving a BA in political economics at Bocconi University, Milan and a doctorate in international economics at Harvard University, he became an academic at Yale and a practicing economist at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Federal Reserve, World Bank, and Bank of Israel. Much of his early research focused on emerging markets. During the administration of President Bill Clinton, he was a senior economist for the Council of Economic Advisers, later moving to the United States Treasury Department as a senior adviser to Timothy Geithner, who in 2009 became Treasury Secretary.

Roubini's critical economic views have earned him the nicknames "Dr. Doom" and "permabear" in the media. In 2008, Fortune magazine wrote, "In 2005 Roubini said home prices were riding a speculative wave that would soon sink the economy. Back then the professor was called a Cassandra. Now he's a sage". The New York Times notes that he foresaw "homeowners defaulting on mortgages, trillions of dollars of mortgage-backed securities unraveling worldwide and the global financial system shuddering to a halt". In September 2006, he warned a skeptical IMF that "the United States was likely to face a once-in-a-lifetime housing bust, an oil shock, sharply declining consumer confidence, and, ultimately, a deep recession". Nobel laureate Paul Krugman adds that his once "seemingly outlandish" predictions have been matched "or even exceeded by reality."

Christine Madeleine Odette Lagarde (née Lallouette; born 1 January 1956) is a French lawyer who has been the Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund since 5 July 2011. Previously, she held various ministerial posts in the French government: she was Minister of Economic Affairs, Finances and Industry and before that Minister of Agriculture and Fishing and Minister of Trade in the government of Dominique de Villepin. Lagarde was the first woman ever to become Minister of Economic Affairs of a G8 economy, and is the first woman to ever head the IMF.

A noted antitrust and labour lawyer, Lagarde made history by becoming the first female chair of the international law firm Baker & McKenzie. On 16 November 2009, the Financial Times ranked her the best Minister of Finance in the Eurozone.

On 28 June 2011, she was named as the next MD of the International Monetary Fund for a five-year term, starting on 5 July 2011, replacing Dominique Strauss-Kahn. Her appointment is the 11th consecutive appointment of a European as head the IMF. In 2011, Lagarde was ranked the 9th most powerful woman in the world by Forbes magazine.

Carlos Slim Helú (Spanish pronunciation: [ˈkaɾlos esˈlim eˈlu]; born January 28, 1940) is a Mexican business magnate and philanthropist who is currently ranked as the richest person in the world in 2012. Slim has been ranked the richest person in the world since 2010. His extensive holdings in a considerable number of Mexican companies through his conglomerate, Grupo Carso, SA de CV, have amassed interests in the fields of communications, technology, retailing, and finance. Presently he is the chairman and chief executive of telecommunications companies Telmex and América Móvil.

América Móvil, which in 2010 was Latin America’s largest mobile-phone carrier, accounted for around US$49 billion of Slim's wealth by the end of 2010. His corporate holdings as of March 2012 have been estimated at US$69 billion.

Slim was born in Mexico City, Mexico in 1940 to Maronite Christian parents Julián Slim Haddad and Linda Helú, both of Lebanese descent. His father, born Khalil Slim Haddad, immigrated to Mexico at the age of 14 in 1902 and changed his first name to Julián. As it was not uncommon for Lebanese children to be sent abroad before they reached the age of 15 to avoid being conscripted into the Ottoman army, four of Haddad's older brothers were already living in Mexico at the time of his arrival.