FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) - The European Central Bank’s leadership has nominated financial regulator Andrea Enria for the job of top European Union banking supervisor, a decision that could influence later jockeying for high EU financial posts.
Enria was nominated Wednesday by the central bank’s governing council to succeed Daniele Nouy as head of the single supervisory mechanism for a single, five-year term. Nouy’s term expires at the end of the year.
Enria is chair of the London-based European Banking Authority, responsible for drawing up rules for European banks. He would take over as chief enforcer of the rule book, heading the ECB’s supervisory arm, created in 2014 as part of the EU response to the continent’s debt crisis. The supervisory arm has the power to pull the plug on failing banks and trigger their restructuring or winding down.
The candidacies of Enria, an Italian, and Irish central bank deputy governor Sharon Donnery were forwarded to the ECB after interviews with members of the EU parliament’s economic committee. The nomination faces a vote in the full EU parliament.
Enria has led stress tests of European banks, the most recent of which was published Friday.
The choice of Enria over Donnery could in theory boost the chances of Irish central bank chief Philip Lane for a choice post coming up next year on the ECB’s six-member executive board, which runs the central bank’s day-to-day operations at its Frankfurt headquarters. The thinking is that Ireland would be less than likely to get two top economic jobs in quick succession.
Peter Praet, the Belgian ECB board member in charge of economics and monetary policy, ends his term in May 2019; whether his replacement will get the same portfolio is not certain.
Ireland has never had an official on the six-member board since the founding of the euro in 1999.
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This story corrects when Praet’s term ends: it is in 2019, not this year.
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