Group of 30 (G-30)

What Is the Group of 30 (G-30)?

The Group of 30, generally abbreviated to G-30, is a private, nonprofit international body composed of academic economists, company chiefs, and representatives of national, regional, and central banks. G-30 members meet twice a year to discuss and better undersand financial and economic issues in the private and public sectors worldwide.

Understanding the Group of 30 (G-30)

The G-30 claims its mission is to deepen understanding of international economic and financial issues and explore the international repercussions of decisions taken in the public and private sectors." It sets out to achieve this by meeting twice yearly in Washington, D.C. Topics that often come up include foreign exchange, capital markets, central banks, and macroeconomic issues, such as global production and labor.

The events hosted by the G-30 are invitation-only, meaning that regular members of the public are not able to attend them. However, the group has made it possible to download its publications and research for free from its website.

Often, the G-30 reports generate little interest from the public due to their technical nature. That said, some of its findings have had a significant impact, including a paper it released on derivatives. At the time, many people were skeptical of derivatives, citing a lack of understanding and the complexity of financial securities, such as forwards, futures, options, swaps, and other similar market contracts that derive their value from an underlying asset.

Aside from meeting twice a year, the G-30 also organizes study groups and seminars based on topics of mutual interest to its membership. Areas of recent focus are said to include financial reform, lessons from the financial crisis, the credit market, and stability and growth.

History of the Group of 30 (G-30)

The G-30 was founded in 1978 by Geoffrey Bell under the directive and initial funding from the Rockefeller Foundation. Before the existence of the G-30, similar aims in understanding economic issues and crises were sought by an organization called the Bellagio Group.

The Bellagio Group, formed by Austrian economist Fritz Machlup, first met in the early 1960s to address international currency issues and the balance of payments (BOP) crisis facing the United States.

The G-30's first chair was Johannes Witteveen, the former managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). As of 2021, the current chair of the G-30 is Jacob Frenkel, former governor of the Bank of Israel and former chairman of Chase International.

Qualifications for the Group of 30 (G-30)

The international body's present and alumni members list reads like a who's who of international finance. Members come from worldwide and are known for holding leadership positions in the public and private sectors. The majority of participants formerly held senior positions in central banking, while many still do.

Current members include Paul Krugman, economist and opinion writer for the New York Times; Jean-Claude Trichet, a former president of the European Central Bank (ECB); Mark Carney, governor of the Bank of England (BoE), and William Dudley, a senior research scholar for economic policy studies at Princeton University, who until 2018 was the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.