Alex Frew McMillan is a widely respected and experienced foreign correspondent, having spent 25 years as a business reporter, feature writer and editor.

He has for the last 15 years been specializing in real-estate coverage, investments and alternative finance in Asia – writing about travel and adventure sports in the region when he gets the time.

McMillan has also developed an intense interest in fitness and nutrition. Most recently, he became a Certified Personal Trainer under the auspices of the National Academy of Sports Medicine. He is also a certified Exercise Nutrition Coach with the Canadian sports-nutrition specialists Precision Nutrition.

He runs the company Mid Age Man (midageman.com.hk) which offers personal training and health advice, advocating exercise and strength conditioning for people enjoying a long “mid age” as well as smart eating, mental wellbeing and a mindful approach to life.

McMillan has worked for some of the most prestigious global media organizations, including CNN, as a senior business reporter, and Reuters, as the Asia real-estate correspondent.

As a free-lancer, he is the Asia columnist for TheStreet.com, delivering insights from Asia three times per week for U.S. readers for its subscription site Real Money.

He also writes regularly for Institutional Real Estate Inc. and has been a frequent contributor to The New York Times. He has also written pieces for Asian Investor, The Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times, Forbes and the Japanese-language publication J-Money, as well as contributing to the Economist Intelligence Unit and CNBC. 

McMillan is currently the Asia editor of Modus, the magazine of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors. He profiles the best and brightest professors at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, bringing the work of some of Asia’s foremost academics to a global audience.

McMillan covered the September 11, 2001 attacks, for CNN, writing the first reaction to the disaster from governments around the world. He also wrote a series of well-regarded stories about greater China’s property slowdown for Reuters, detailing the bricks and mortar growth of the world’s second-biggest economy. His real-estate coverage has explained the importance of property trends for institutional investors as well as for individual property owners. He also covered the hedge-fund industry for six years and has delved into other alternatives such as private equity, as well as writing about personal finance, in particular exchange-traded funds.

Since moving from New York City to Hong Kong 19 years ago, he has devoted himself to coverage of Asia, focusing on full-length features, analysis pieces and multimedia Web stories, which have also run in the South China Morning Post, The Australian and the Straits Times, as well as many magazines, in print and digital form. An early adopter and advocate of the power of the Internet to deliver compelling news, he took his first full-time online position in 1999 with CNNMoney.com. He has also made numerous appearances on both television and radio to discuss his work.

With a South African father and British mother, Bristol-born McMillan graduated from Radley College near Oxford and took up a Morehead-Cain Scholarship to study in the United States. The Morehead is one of the best-known merit scholarships in the country, offered to candidates considered to have leadership potential. He graduated with a degree in Journalism and English from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, with honors and distinction, and serves as chairman of the university’s alumni association in Hong Kong.

Besides reporting, he is also an avid tennis player, snowboarder and scuba diver, and is a PADI-certified divemaster. Now that he is a Certified Personal Trainer, he is also training to be a sports-nutrition coach with Precision Nutrition.

Download Alex Frew McMillan’s résumé for 2024.