Vahan Zanoyan is a writer, traveler, retired executive, and anti-trafficking advocate.

Educated at The American University in Beirut (Political Science and Economics) and at the University of Pennsylvania (Economics), Zanoyan has done pioneering work in applied analysis of the political economies of oil producing countries and their development process.

From 2009-2010 Zanoyan served as the founding Chief Executive Officer of First Energy Bank, a specialized investment bank in energy based in Bahrain.

From 2005-2009, he was the Chairman and Chief Executive of PFC Energy International, in Lausanne, Switzerland. Prior to assuming this position, he served as President and CEO of PFC Energy for ten years, from 1996 to 2005, based in Washington, DC. His advisory firm specialized in the commercial, political and strategic aspects of the global oil, gas and power business. In 1987, Zanoyan founded PFC’s Market Intelligence Service (MIS), which he headed until his appointment as CEO in 1996.

Prior to joining PFC Energy, Zanoyan was a Managing Director at Wharton Econometric Forecasting Associates. During his tenure at Wharton, he founded The Middle East Economic Service, and served as the company’s resident expert on oil markets. He was also the Managing Director in charge of all economic consulting services that covered Latin America, Asia, the Centrally Planned Economies, the Middle East and North and Sub-Saharan Africa.

Zanoyan has served as a consultant to numerous international and national oil companies, banks, and other private and public organizations throughout the United States, Europe, the Middle East, the Far East and Latin America. In addition, he has served as a senior economic and oil policy advisor to many oil producing governments.

Zanoyan has published two volumes of poetry in Armenian, (2010 and 2011); and four novels in English, A Place Far Away (2013) and The Doves of Ohanavank (2014), both of which were inspired by a chance meeting with a very young victim of sex trafficking, The Sacred Sands (2016), inspired by his experiences as an international energy and geopolitical consultant, and Waking Noah’s Vines, about the rebirth of the age-old tradition of wine making in Armenia.

He loves to travel, read, write, drink good wine, and supports several humanitarian causes, primarily aimed at stopping human trafficking and supporting victims of sex trafficking and domestic violence.