At 59 years old, Christine Lagarde has a string of achievements that are the envy of her peers. The company that she keeps is anything but ordinary – she is leading one of the most influential and powerful financial institutions in the world – the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The IMF comprises 188 countries which cooperate with one another for the purposes of monetary and financial stability. It was founded at the Bretton Woods conference in New Hampshire in December 1945. Christine Lagarde has been serving as the Chief Executive officer of the IMF since 5 July 2011. Prior to that, she was the French Minister of Finance from 19 June 2007 through 29 June 2011. She has also held several other posts in France including the Minister of Agriculture under President Nicolas Sarkozy, and the Minister of Commerce and Industry under President Jacques Chirac. She is a member of the Union for a Popular Movement Political Party, and one of the most instantly recognisable names in European politics and global finance.
It is rather peculiar that there are several things about Christine Lagarde that would appear to disqualify her from holding the highest office – yet these are aspects of her personality that propelled her to greatness. Among others, she failed twice to gain admission to France’s National School of Administration. This is the top school for civil servants to attend. And at a critical juncture in her career, she rejected work at a prominent law school in Paris after being told that she would never become a partner because she was a female. According to Christine, the ‘overwhelming sense of freedom’ that she experienced after rejecting the job offer was the most liberating thing that she had done in her life. If adversity is something that is supposed to prevent a person from achieving greatness, even the most crippling of diseases was not enough to stop Christine’s inexorable march to greatness. Her father died of Motor Neuron Disease when she was just 16 years old. Her prowess in the academic and economic arena is equally matched with her abilities in the sporting world. At the age of just 15, she was awarded a bronze medal in the French National Championship swimming team. With all that said and done, her rise to fame, fortune and prominence was clearly on the horizon.
Up Close and Personal with Christine Lagarde
Christine Lagarde has an accomplished career as a lawyer. She joined Baker and McKenzie back in 1981 where she was charged with handling labor-related cases and antitrust cases. She was soon made a partner of the law firm and within 6 years she headed the firm in Western Europe. By 1999 she was the company’s first female chairperson and 5 years later she was elected the Global Strategic Committee president. Her rise to superstardom in the finance world came with her candidacy for head of the International Monetary Fund on May 25, 2011. Multiple governments supported her appointment including Germany, China, the United States, Brazil, Russia, India and the United Kingdom. By June 28, 2011 she was elected for a 5-year term as the Chief Executive Officer of the International Monetary Fund. Christine is an imposing person at 6 feet tall, but it is her ability to captivate the attention of everyone in the room that allows her to command the respect of dignitaries, presidents, prime ministers and world leaders.
She is presently rated #6 on the Forbes most powerful women list. She is a French national residing in Washington DC with 2 children. Her educational qualifications include a Master of Arts at Institut d’etudes politiques d’Aix-en-Provence. She is currently in her final year as the CEO of the IMF, and her tenure has ushered the world through one of the most treacherous global economic times in recent history. According to Christine Lagarde, world growth is projected at 3.5% per annum, marginally higher than the rate for 2014, but down 0.5% from 2011. She is of the opinion that current trends are what she terms the new mediocre, and she has been outspoken about this new reality that the world is facing. Christine is deeply involved in the role that EM economies play in the world on an individual basis. She also places significant emphasis on how important the Fed is vis-a-vis monetary policy and its impact on emerging market countries and the world at large. A strong proponent of equality in labor force participation, Lagarde has the dual objectives of poverty reduction and an increase in female participation in the global workforce.
Crunching the Numbers: Christine Lagarde Net Worth
As #11 on the managing directors’ list for the IMF, Christine Lagarde has a personal net worth of $4 million. The vast majority of her multi-million dollar fortune comes from her work as a lawyer at Baker and McKenzie. Her positions as Executive Committee Chairman and head of the Western European division of the law firm have also allowed her to increase her net worth. She has resided in the United States for several decades, and even served as an assistant to Congressman William Cohen in the Capitol back in 1974. Twice divorced, she has been living with Xavier Giocanti a successful businessman since 2006.
Christine has also been portrayed by Laila Robins in the 2011 at HBO film – Too Big to Fail. The movie scored a 7.4/10 rating by over 10,025 users on IMDb, making it one of the most poignant chronicles of the financial meltdown of 2008 and of Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson. In the same year, she appeared in Vogue magazine, was interviewed by the Guardian, PBS NewsHour and in a documentary film with the title Inside Job. This film from 2010 scored a rating of 8.3/10 from over 50,400 users at IMDB, and it also takes a close look at the causes of the global financial meltdown of 2008/9. It was a critically acclaimed work by director Charles Ferguson, and it starred Matt Damon and William Ackman. Christine Lagarde’s star continues to shine brightly even as her tenure at the International Monetary Fund enters its final year.
