Three years on Central Bank still to appoint head of stability

The Central Bank still has to appoint a head of the financial stability division three years after the previous head left the post.

A spokesperson for the Central Bank said that a search is under way and that the position will be filled when a suitable candidate is found.

The financial stability division currently has two deputy heads. However, one of the current deputy heads, Trevor Fitzpatrick, is taking a sabbatical from his position.

The financial stability division is part of the economics directorate, which is headed by Lars Frisell. There are four divisions within this directorate: monetary policy; statistics; Irish economic analysis; and financial stability unit.

The Central Bank spokesperson says that three divisions, excluding financial stability, all have department heads and deputy heads in place.

There are currently just under 1,500 people working for the Central Bank with roughly half of these in the supervision division.

The bank is currently looking for a deputy governor following the announcement earlier this year that Matthew Elderfield was leaving this post in October to take up a position with Lloyd’s Banking Group in London.

The Central Bank spokesperson said no decision has been made yet on Mr Elderfield’s replacement. However, Central Bank director Fiona Muldoon is the favourite to become the next deputy governor.

But one person familiar with the situation said that the Central Bank would find it hard to attract key personnel in future because some of the bank’s most important functions were being transferred to the ECB in 2014.

As part of the proposed EU banking union, the ECB will take over the direct supervision of an estimated 6,400 financial institutions across the region, including AIB and Bank of Ireland.