Christine Lagarde said her “baseline” is that she will stay at the European Central Bank until her term as president ends in October 2027.

“I think that we have accomplished a lot, that I have accomplished a lot,” she said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal, published on Friday. “We need to consolidate and make sure that this is really solid and reliable. So my baseline is that it will take until the end of my term.”

Her comments come two days after a report in the FT, sourced to a single person “familiar with her thinking,” suggested the opposite. The article triggered controversy, implying that the appointment of the next ECB president could be moved up to deny a possible far-right president in France any say in the matter. President Emmanuel Macron is due to step down in April next year.

Lagarde played down suggestions she would be complicit in undermining the independence of the ECB from political influence by going along with any such plan.

“The ECB is a very respected and credible institution, and I hope that I’ve participated in that,” she said.

Lagarde’s comments to The Wall Street Journal are the latest in a series of carefully caveated statements about her future that have generally left her some wiggle room. She confirmed that she is already thinking about her next move, telling the paper that “one of the many options” she is looking at is to take over running the World Economic Forum. The WEF’s founder Klaus Schwab said last year he had discussed the possibility of her leaving the Bank early to succeed him in Davos.

Source:

www.politico.eu