Sophie has over twenty-five years’ experience in international capital markets and global trust funds, with a focus on international development and climate change.

As Senior Counsel to the Treasury and Co-financing Vice Presidency of the World Bank from 1990 to 2007, she specialized in helping to design and structure financing facilities for climate change, financial sector reform, health, and education. In 2007, she left the World Bank to become Associate Professor of International Financial Law at Temple University, Beasley School of Law, where she taught until 2016, and published and presented broadly on global financing arrangements to address international development needs.

Since 2016, Sophie has worked with the World Bank on a range of trust funds, and on the creation of a new multi-billion financing facility focused on reforestation. She has also co-lead an independent operational and governance review of the Climate Investment Fund, and worked with the Asian Development Bank on structuring options for two ASEAN-focused trust funds. In addition, she has advised several developing country teams, and private project developers in Ireland and the Western US, on early-stage infrastructure project development. She is part of the Finance to Accelerate the Sustainable Transition Initiative (FAST Infra), a public-private global initiative that seeks to catalyze private sector investment in sustainable infrastructure.

A Senior Adviser with Sustainable Finance Ireland since 2018, Sophie works closely with the Irish Department of Finance on efforts to situate Ireland as a European hub of sustainable finance. She also served as a member of the Financial Regulations Policy Working Group on Climate Change for the Biden Campaign.

Sophie began her career as a Trial Lawyer on the US Department of Justice Civil Division, Banking Litigation Defense Team, following a judicial clerkship with Judge Hugh Bownes on the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit.

Sophie holds a B.A. from Trinity College, Dublin, a B.C.L. from Oxford University, England, and an LL.M. from Georgetown University Law Center, and is a member of the State Bar of Michigan. She is a dual citizen of Ireland and the United States.