The Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy, could hardly wish for a more respected and influential supporter than Robert Mundell, when he argues with EU finance ministers on February 12th.

Prof Mundell is seen as the spiritual father of the euro. One of the best known economists in the US, and indeed globally, he received the Nobel prize for economics in 1999.

He has been professor of economics at Columbia University since 1974. He has also worked at the London School of Economics, Stanford University and the University of Chicago, among many others.

Prof Mundell is hugely influential and has been an adviser at different times to a host of major international agencies including the United Nations, the IMF, the World Bank, the European Commission and several governments in Latin America and Europe.

He has also advised the Federal Reserve Board, the US Treasury and the Canadian government. Crucially for Mr McCreevy, Prof Mundell has excellent credentials on the euro and European economic and monetary union.

In 1970, he was a consultant to the monetary committee of the European Economic Commission and, in 1972-73, a member of its study group on Economic and Monetary Union in Europe. He wrote the first plans for a common currency in Europe and is known as the father of the theory of optimum currency areas.

He was a pioneer of the theory of the monetary and fiscal policy mix, the theory of inflation and interest and growth, the monetary approach to the balance of payments, and the co-founder of supply-side economics. He has also written extensively on the history of the international monetary system. His Nobel prize in 1999 was for his analysis of monetary and fiscal policy under different exchange rate regimes and his analysis of different currency areas.

He was made a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in October 1998.