Helima is a Managing Director and the Head of Global Commodity Strategy and 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. Helima 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, a Life Member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and is a member of the Oxford Energy Policy Club. Helima 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. Helima has received many industry accolades throughout her career and received her PhD in economic history from Princeton in 2001.
Mele Kyari
Group Managing Director
Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation
Mele Kyari is the group managing director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), a position to which he was appointed in July 2019. Prior to his appointment by Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, Mr. Kyari served as Nigeria’s National Representative to OPEC and held a variety of management positions in the NNPC’s crude oil marketing division. Before joining the NNPC, Mr. Kyari served as an exploration geophysicist and Abuja operations manager of the National Petroleum Investment Management Services, a seismic data processing geophysicist with an NNPC subsidiary, and an employee of the Nigerian Geological Survey Agency. He holds a bachelor’s degree in geology and earth science from the University of Maiduguri and fulfilled his National Youth Service Corp requirement as a well site geologist with the Directorate of Foods, Roads, and Rural Infrastructure in Nigeria.
About the Atlantic Council
The Atlantic Council promotes constructive leadership and engagement in international affairs based on the Atlantic Community’s central role in meeting global challenges. The Council provides an essential forum for navigating the dramatic economic and political changes defining the twenty-first century by informing and galvanizing its uniquely influential network of global leaders. The Atlantic Council—through the papers it publishes, the ideas it generates, the future leaders it develops, and the communities it builds—shapes policy choices and strategies to create a more free, secure, and prosperous world.
