Over the last 25 years Dr. David Asher has worked extensively in and around the financial industry as well as the US Government. He has focused primarily on Japan and Asia, including advising the highest profile and most successful US activist manager on Abenomics and Japan investment strategy since 2013 and now supports one of the world’s largest macro funds as well. David worked as Global Macro Strategist and Principal at Medley Capital (2007-2009) and as Senior Advisor for strategic planning to the Global Senior Executive Officer of Mitsubishi UFJ (2009-2010).  He then co-founded both Vital Financial and Vital Venture Capital with his brother as offshoots from their family office.  

 

From 2001-2005 David served as Senior Advisor for East Asian and Pacific Affairs at the Department of State, where he was also the Coordinator of the North Korea Working Group, and directed a restricted Policy Coordinating Committee at the NSC. From 2002-2004 he was the Coordinator of the US-Japan Strategic Dialogue for the State Department. From 2001-2002 David was a Sherpa for the US-Japan economic and financial revitalization dialogue between the White House and the Japanese Prime Minister's Office.  David covered Japan as a consultant for two macro hedge funds in the 1990s-2001. During this time he helped the Japanese government develop the policy for what eventually became the Industrial Revitalization Corporation of Japan. He also was one of the early proponents of the Big Bang financial reforms of the mid 1990s, including while serving as a researcher at both the Japanese Ministry of Finance and Bank of Japan. He is widely published and cited on Japan financial, economic, and security issues. Among other publications, he is a co-author of the last two Armitage-Nye Reports on US-Japan Relations. 

 

David is fluent in Japanese and has a D.Phil in International Relations with a focus on economic history from Oxford University. His doctoral dissertation examined the failure of economic reform in interwar Japan and the rise of military nationalism. David is a member of the Research Advisory Board for BCA Research and contributes to their publications periodically. He also is the Chairman of Sayari Analytics and serves on the Board of the Center for Sanctions and Illicit Finance at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.  

 

Apart from work in the financial and think tank communities, David is well known as a pioneer and thought leader in financial operations, financial intelligence, and economic pressure strategy within the US diplomatic, military, law enforcement, and intelligence communities. For State, NSC, Treasury, SOCOM, CENTOM, CIA, and DEA he organized and spearheaded numerous strategic counter threat finance initiatives that have resulted in billions of dollars in financial losses for America’s adversaries.