The present invention is to provide a method of producing a glyceric acid ester which is easy for production and high in yield, and in which a pyridine to be used for the reaction is easily reused. Provided is a method of producing a compound represented by the following formula (II), including a step of oxidatively esterifying Compound A represented by the following formula (I) with Compound B selected from an organic nitroxyl radical, an N-hydroxy form thereof, and a salt containing an oxo ammonium cation of them, and an oxidizing agent in the presence of a pyridine having an alkyl substituent, wherein the use amount of Compound B is 0.0001 or more and 0.1 or less in terms of a molar ratio relative to Compound A:
wherein, in the formulae (I) and (II), R
1
and R
2
each independently represent a hydrogen atom or a monovalent hydrocarbon group, or R
1
and R
2
are bonded to each other to form a divalent hydrocarbon group for constituting a ring structure.
The present invention relates to providing a novel glyceric acid ester which can be produced in a high yield and is expected to be applied as a synthetic intermediate, and a method of producing the same. In addition, the present invention relates to providing a novel glyceric acid ester which exhibits a high recovery in a water-washing step after the reaction and a small work load at the time of production, and is expected to be applied as a synthetic intermediate, and a method of producing the same. The present invention provides a method of producing a compound represented by the following formula (II), including a step of oxidatively esterifying a compound represented by the following formula (I):
wherein, in the formulae (I) and (II), R1 and R2 each independently represent a hydrogen atom or a monovalent hydrocarbon group, or R1 and R2 are bonded to each other to form a divalent hydrocarbon group for constituting a ring structure, provided that the case where R1 and R2 are a methyl group at the same time is excluded.