Jean-Marc Natal is the Head of the Commodities Unit at the IMF and former Deputy Chief of the World Economic Studies Division in the IMF’s Research Department. Prior to joining the IMF, he was Deputy Director of Research at the Swiss National Bank where he advised the Board on quarterly monetary policy decisions and communication. Mr Natal has taught Monetary Theory and Policy at the University of Geneva and has published in various economics journals, including the Economic Journal and the Journal of Money, Credit and Banking. His research covers the study of the importance of commodity markets for macroeconomic fluctuations, monetary and exchange rate regimes, optimal monetary and financial policy, inflation dynamics and macroeconomic modeling. He holds a PhD in International Economics from the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva.