Dr Helima Croft is a Managing Director and the Head of Global Commodity Strategy and Middle East and North Africa (Mena) Research at RBC Capital Markets. She specializes in geopolitics and energy, leading a team of commodity strategists that cover energy, metals and cross-commodity investor activity, as well as policy analysis and both Washington and global political insights.

Dr Croft is a member of the National Petroleum Council, a select group of individuals who advise, inform and make recommendations to the Secretary of Energy with respect to any matter relating to oil and natural gas. She also is a CNBC contributor, a member of the channel’s exclusive family of experts, is on the board of directors for the Atlantic Council, and is a Life Member of the Council on Foreign Relations. She is on the board of directors of Reservoir Media, the first female-founded and -led publicly traded independent music company in the US.

Dr Croft joined RBC Capital Markets from Barclays, where she was a Managing Director and Head of North American Commodities Research. Prior to that, she worked in Lehman’s Business Intelligence Group, the Council on Foreign Relations and the Central Intelligence Agency, where she focused on geopolitics and commodities.

Dr Croft has received many industry accolades throughout her career and received her PhD in economic history from Princeton in 2001.