Charles François Laurent (12 November 1856 – 16 February 1939) was a French senior civil servant, specializing in finance.

[8] Laurent succeeded Florent Guillain (1844–1915) as president of the Comité des forges de France (CFF).

[12] While president of the CFF Laurent joined the Confédération générale de la production française (CGPF).

[16] Laurent returned to public service as French ambassador in Berlin from June 1920 to December 1922.

[18] Towards the end of 1920 Laurent led negotiations by a group of French and German businesses concerning the Upper Silesian industries.

The concept was that French firms would obtain options on 25% of the main German companies in the region and would be represented on their boards, while the companies would be rescued from liquidation and the French would guarantee that Upper Silesia would remain German rather than be transferred to Poland.

[19] In a meeting in Paris on 8 January 1821 Jacques Seydoux told D'Abernon that the French proposed to indefinitely postpone discussion of cash reparations.

[20] Soon after this Laurent recommended that Walter Simons, German Minister of Foreign Affairs, accept the Seydoux proposals as a basis for discussion and agree not to push for a declaration of the totals amount of the reparations.

[23] While ambassador Laurent continued as President of Thomson-Houston and remained on the board of the Suez Canal Company.

[24] On 30 January 1926 Humbert de Wendel met in Luxembourg with Fritz Thyssen and Charles François Laurent in a meeting chaired by Émile Mayrisch where they reviewed and approved a draft proposal by Thyssen for an international steel cartel.

After further negotiations, this led to creation of the International Steel Agreement (Entente Internationale de l’Acier) on 30 September 1926, which defined a system of quotas for Germany, France, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Saar.

Laurent offered support to the right-wing activist François de La Rocque from this fund.