Stanley Fischer | |
---|---|
Born | Northern Rhodesia (Now Zambia) | 15 October 1943
Nationality | ![]() |
Academic career | |
Institution | Bank of Israel 2005– Citigroup 2002–05 IMF 1994–01 World Bank 1988–90 MIT 1973-88, 1990–94 |
Field | Financial economics |
School or tradition | New Keynesian economics |
Alma mater | MIT (Ph.D.) LSE (B.Sc., M.Sc.) |
Influences | Franklin M. Fisher |
Stanley "Stan" Fischer (Hebrew: סטנלי פישר) is an economist and the current Governor of the Bank of Israel.
Born in Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia) on 15 October 1943, he obtained his B.Sc. and M.Sc. at the London School of Economics from 1962–1966 and his Ph.D. at MIT in 1969, all in economics.
He was a professor at MIT from 1977 to 1988, where he authored two popular economics textbooks, Macroeconomics (with Rüdiger Dornbusch and Richard Startz), and Lectures on Macroeconomics (with Olivier Blanchard). He was also Ben Bernanke's Ph.D. thesis advisor.
From January 1988 to August 1990 he was Vice President, Development Economics and Chief Economist at the World Bank. He then became the First Deputy Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund, from September 1994 until the end of August 2001. By the end of 2001 Dr. Fischer had joined the influential Washington-based financial advisory body, the Group of Thirty. After leaving the IMF, he served as Vice Chairman of Citigroup, President of Citigroup International, and Head of the Public Sector Client Group. Dr. Fischer worked at Citigroup from February, 2002 to April, 2005.
He became Governor of the Bank of Israel on May 1, 2005, replacing David Klein, who ended his term on January 16, 2005. Fischer became an Israeli citizen, the aforementioned action being a prerequisite to this appointment. He has been involved in the past with the Bank of Israel, having served as an American government adviser to Israel's economic stabilization program in 1985. On May 2, 2010, Fischer was sworn in for a second term.[1]
Under his management, in 2010, The Bank of Israel was ranked first among central banks for its efficient functioning, according to IMD's World Competitiveness Yearbook.[2]
Fischer has earned plaudits across the board for his handling of the Israeli economy in the aftermath of the global financial crisis. In September 2009, the Bank of Israel was the first bank in the developed world to raise its interest rates.[3]
In 2009 and 2010, Fischer received an "A" rating on the Central Banker Report Card published by Global Finance magazine.[4][5]
In October of 2010, Fischer was declared Central Bank Governor of the Year by Euromoney magazine. Fischer received the award at a reception at the Willard Intercontinental hotel in Washington, D.C. during a World Bank and International Monetary Fund conference.[6]
He is also the recipient of an honorary doctorate from Hebrew University in 2006.[7]