President Lee Jae Myung nominated Shin Hyun-song, an official at the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), as the new governor of the Bank of Korea (BOK) on Sunday. Shin will replace current Gov. Rhee Chang-yong at the end of his four-year term in April. The choice aims to balance price stability and economic growth amid global uncertainty from the Middle East crisis.
SEOUL, March 22 (Yonhap) -- President Lee Jae Myung nominated Shin Hyun-song, head of the monetary and economic department at the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), as the new governor of the Bank of Korea (BOK) on Sunday, his office said. Shin, who would replace current Gov. Rhee Chang-yong at the end of his four-year term in April, is a leading expert on international finance and macroeconomics with academic depth and practical insight, a presidential spokesperson said. Lee Kyu-youn, senior presidential secretary for public relations and communication, said during a press briefing, 'He is the right person to simultaneously achieve the monetary policy goals of price stability and growth of the people's economy at a time when global economic uncertainty has increased due to the situation in the Middle East.' Born in 1959, Shin studied politics, philosophy and economics at the University of Oxford, where he earned master's and doctoral degrees in economics. He taught at Oxford, the London School of Economics and Princeton University. Shin served as a resident scholar at the International Monetary Fund in 2005, a member of the Financial Advisory Roundtable at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in 2006, and adviser for international economic affairs to former President Lee Myung-bak in 2010. In 2014, he became head of research at the BIS, the first non-American or non-European in the role, and has headed its monetary and economic department since 2025. He is recognized for expertise in financial stability and macroprudential policy, notably anticipating the 2008 global financial crisis at IMF meetings in 2006. The BOK held its benchmark interest rate at 2.5 percent in its latest meeting last month, the sixth consecutive hold, amid a weak won and unstable housing market. A parliamentary confirmation hearing is seen as a formality. The Middle East crisis has raised stagflation concerns.
