Larry McDonald
Larry McDonald is a noted economist, political risk expert, CNBC contributor, and New York Times bestselling author. He is the Creator and Editor of The Bear Traps Report, an independent macro research platform and one of the most highly regarded on Wall Street. He is also a Managing Director and Global Head of Macro Strategy of ACG Analytics, a research firm at the intersection of capital markets and public policy. Larry is one of today's leading political policy risk strategists and consultants to hedge funds, family offices, asset managers and high net worth investors. Earlier in his career, Larry was Managing Director and Head of US Macro Strategy at Société Générale, and Vice President at Lehman Brothers, where he ran a $500 million proprietary trading book. He also ran an extremely successful joint venture between Lehman Brothers’ fixed income and equity divisions.
Larry McDonald Professional Experience / Academic History
Professional Experience
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Managing Director and Global Head of Macro Strategy
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Contributor
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Founder and Creator
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Host and Creator of Larry McDonald Series
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Managing Director and US Head of Macro Strategy
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Vice President and Senior Trader
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Convertible Securities Research and Sales
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Retail Financial Advisor
Academic History
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B.A., Economics
The Bear Traps Report is a weekly independent investment newsletter focusing on global political and systematic risk with actionable trade ideas.
The report provides clients with a timely, first-hand look at global political market moving events.
He presents his captivating views on the Trump Administration, U.S. Financial Crisis, European Sovereign Debt, and China’s Economic Meltdown - spiced with actionable risk indicators, risk management lessons, and sprinkled with humor.
At Lehman Brothers, Larry led his team into betting against the subprime mortgage market, profiting the firm over $2 billion before its demise.
At the height of the 2008 financial crisis, he wrote a book on the fall of Lehman Brothers, “A Colossal Failure of Common Sense.”
He was considered one of the firm's most profitable traders, and made over $75M betting against the subprime mortgage crisis.
He also implemented the firm's first, highly successful cross-divisional JV between high-yield, distressed, and convertible securities.
EARLY CAREER & EXPERTISE
Larry makes weekly appearances on CNBC as a contributor focused on political and economic risk and opportunities.
His risk indicators help investors get in front of painful risk-off trades in the global markets.
He was the Co-Founder of Convertbond.com, a website that provided convertible securities information with news, valuation, terms and analysis tools for convertible bonds, convertible preferred stocks, and other convertible securities. Convertbond was acquired by Morgan Stanley in 1999.
PUBLICATIONS
Larry is a New York Times bestselling author, his book "A Colossal Failure of Common Sense" is now translated into 12 languages.
A Colossal Failure of Common Sense is a risk manager’s guide to the right and wrong moves on Wall Street, and explains why investors must stay ahead of policies coming out of Washington, D.C. and Europe.
His new book, How to Listen When Markets Speak, unveils his unique predictive models, connecting dots between past, present, and future and outlining actionable trading ideas for staying a beat ahead of the markets.
MEDIA & APPEARANCES
Larry is a frequent guest contributor on Bloomberg, CNBC, Fox Business, Forbes, and the BBC.
He has also appeared in Yahoo! Finance, Markets Insider, The New York Times, Barron's, The Wall Street Journal, MSNBC, CNN, Top Traders Unplugged, MarketWatch, Seeking Alpha, Blockworks, Real Vision, and more.
He has delivered over 72 keynote speeches in 17 different countries, at banks, investment firms, conferences, law firms, insurance companies and universities.
He has participated in four major financial crisis documentaries: BBC’s The Love of Money, CBC’s House of Cards, National Geographic’s Decade of the 2000s, and Sony Pictures’ Academy Award winning documentary Inside Job.