Sinclair is an expert on China's financial system and his research studies how powerful governments shape financial market outcomes.

China offers some of the most interesting puzzles in economics. Much of economic theory is universal, but many fields, especially finance, have been implicitly built on the assumption of Western institutions such as democracy and the rule of law. In his research, Sinclair seeks to understand how modern China works by studying how people rationally behave and invest under the presence of a large, powerful, and dynamic central government.

Sinclair completed his PhD in financial economics at Yale University and he was previously on the faculty at The University of Hong Kong (HKU). His work has been published in top economics journals, including The Economic Journal and the Journal of Economic Theory, and covered in the media by the Financial Times, Bloomberg, and Vox China. He has been invited to present his work on China at many top global institutions, including Yale University, the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, BlackRock, and the Hoover Institute at Stanford (YouTube link).

A list of Sinclair's research papers can be found on his website.