Trade Panel
Michael Burt, Executive Director, Industrial Economic Trends The Conference Board of Canada
Michael Burt is the Director responsible for the Industrial Economic Trends group at The Conference Board of Canada. Mr. Burt joined the CBoC in 2004, he has moved progressively into more senior positions since joining the Board. Before joining the Board he worked with an economic consulting firm in the United States.
In his role, Mr. Burt oversees the maintenance and production of the group’s forecasts and analysis. He is also the project manager for the consulting work that the group completes. Mr. Burt is a spokesperson for the Conference Board and does presentations on the industrial forecast to clients and the public and is often cited in the media. Mr. Burt has more than sixteen years of experience conducting industry forecasting and analysis. Mr. Burt has a Master’s degree in economics from the University of Toronto, and has also completed the Chartered Financial Analyst program.
John W. Harris, P.Eng. CEO/Owner, Aaristic Services Inc.
Since June 2011, Mr. Harris has worked regularly with market analysis companies supplying knowledge and global market intelligence to their market investment clients. He has advised company Boards of Directors, consulted and provided workshops for mining companies, manufacturers for the steel industry and many scrap recycling organizations. He has also been an expert witness for both an international commercial case and a U.S. criminal scrap metal theft case. He has been a regular speaker and presenter at conference meetings for IIMA, ISRI, and CARI. In September 2017, he was appointed as an Advisor to the Board of Directors of Petram Technologies, which owns patents developed by NASA to do mining on the moon and has global rights on earth to market and sell technology.
Mr. Harris retired from ArcelorMittal in June 2011 after 11 years as Director, Raw Materials, Technical Applications. His responsibilities for the company encompassed selling all merchant DRI (approx. 700,000 mt/year), participating in final Due Diligence for new plant purchases (specializing in metallics assessments), purchasing scrap for all NAFTA plants (approx. 600,000 mt/month) through a team of procurement specialists at each plant, and writing a weekly Global Metallics Report for corporate and senior management.
Industry Panel
Sarah Howcroft, CFA | Senior Economist & Vice President | Economic Research BMO Capital Markets
Sarah joined the Bank of Montreal in 2016 as a member of the Capital Markets Economic Risk team. In this role she conducts risk analysis across a range of countries and sectors, and presents to various internal and external groups. She is also the editor of BMO Capital Markets’ monthly commodity price publication, The Goods, reporting on metals markets.
Sarah joined BMO at the start of 2016, following time spent at the Ontario Securities Commission, Scotiabank and the Bank of Canada. She holds an undergraduate degree from Queen’s University, a Master’s degree in Economics from the University of Toronto and the CFA designation.
Howcroft Presentation CARI 2018
Xavier McClafferty, Argus Media
Xavier is a market reporter for Argus Media’s ferrous scrap team, covering U.S. and Canadian domestic trade as well as seaborne bulk and container activity.
Prior to joining Argus, Xavier spent nearly a decade in various analytical roles with European Metal Recycling (EMR), including helping to lead the company’s U.S. M&A activity during 2006-2008.
After leaving EMR to launch an automobile recycling business, Xavier later re-joined the company as co-founder and Director of Business Development of its automobile recycling division, My Auto Store. Xavier graduated from Drexel University in Philadelphia with a BS in Finance and Economics.
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