The ECB steps up the pace on the post-Lagarde leadership succession

The former French governor François Villeroy de Galhau and the current president of the Bundesbank, Joachim Nagel – both pro-European, highly respected and extremely competent – are hoping to join the Board, but it is said they cannot aspire to the chairmanship. And they are men.

The simultaneous departure of the only two women on the Governing Council, Lagarde and Schnabel, has drawn attention to female candidates: for France, big names are being mentioned such as Agnès Bénassy-Quéré, Deputy Governor of the Banque de France, Laurence Boone, former chief economist at the OECD, and Hélène Rey, a world-renowned economist who has been in charge of monetary policy at the BIS since 1 September.

Berlin could put forward the Bundesbank’s deputy governor, Sabine Mauderer, the macroeconomist Monika Piazzesi, or Elga Bartsch, Director-General for Economic Policy at the Ministry of Economy. Germany, however, holds a rather unusual record: its Board members tend to resign before the end of their term of office.

This was the case for Jürgen Stark, Jörg Asmussen, Sabine Lautenschläger and now Schnabel, though not Otmar Issing. Meanwhile, Jens Weidmann, Draghi’s main opponent, tendered his early resignation as President of the Bundesbank.

The Italian government appears to be staying out of the big picture, at least for now, having already secured the appointment of Carlo Comporti to ESMA, a post he will take up on 1 November 2026. Governor Fabio Panetta, a former member of the ECB’s Executive Board, does not appear to be a candidate put forward by the Meloni government.

Germany, which already has Ursula von der Leyen as President of the Commission and Claudia Buch at the helm of the ECB/SSM, is aiming for the post of the ECB’s new Chief Economist (the Irishman Philip Lane’s term expires at the end of May 2027), the member of the Executive Board responsible for markets (Isabel Schnabel is due to step down in January 2027) or the Vice-Chair of the Supervisory Board should Frank Elderson leave early following Knot’s arrival, as happened with Lorenzo Bini Smaghi when Mario Draghi took office: there has never been a German ECB President to date, but it is said that the time is not yet right on this occasion either. And Nagel is too pro-European and not hawkish enough for a government grappling with the rise of the AfD.

France has already had two presidents, Jean-Claude Trichet and Lagarde, but is now demanding a dovish French chief economist – a post wielding considerable influence within the Governing Council, particularly when the ECB presidency is weak, as in Lagarde’s case; but this would not be the case with Knot, who knows his stuff: rumour has it that the Dutch ‘hawk’ is being backed by Paris in a bid to secure the post of chief economist for France.

Spain stands a good chance with de Cos, who is reportedly being backed by Berlin in exchange for the post of chief economist. A Spaniard and a Croatian at the helm? It wouldn’t be the first time the ECB’s president and vice-president have come from outside the ‘Big Four’.

The ECB’s Governing Council comprises 27 members: 21 governors of the Eurosystem central banks and six members of the Executive Board. Over the past four years, more than half of the governors have changed, and the ‘hawkometer’ now indicates a neutral Governing Council. But with the arrival of three or even four new members on the Executive Board, the ECB’s composition is changing once again. The departure of Knot and Schnabel, regarded as leading ‘hawks’, is offset by the departure of prominent ‘doves’ such as Lane and De Guindos (the former Spanish vice-president). There are no ‘owls’ – such as Lagarde, who used to tout the Governing Council’s unanimous decisions – to be found.