Economics

Decision Time for World's Longest-Serving Central Bank Boss

Romania’s Isarescu mulling future after 28 years at the helm
Bank’s independence in focus as shakeup of entire board looms

Mugur Isarescu
Photographer: Daniel Mihailescu/AFP/Getty Images

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By Irina Vilcu and Andra Timu

May 21, 2019 at 4:00 AM UTC

Updated on

May 21, 2019 at 11:53 AM UTC

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It’s nearing time for Mugur Isarescu to decide whether he’ll prolong his more than quarter-century tenure as the longest-serving central bank boss in the world right now.

The 69-year-old governor of the National Bank of Romania has lived through everything from hyperinflation and his country being on the brink of bankruptcy to the global financial crisis of 2008. What he does when his current term ends in October could owe a lot to the perilous state of central-bank independence in the age of populism.