Spain and Netherlands nominate ECB president candidates to replace Lagarde

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BRUSSELS — The Netherlands and Spain on Friday submitted candidates to succeed Christine Lagarde, who steps down as president of the European Central Bank on Feb. 7.

Pablo Hernández de Cos, a former governor of Spain’s central bank, and the Netherlands’ Klaas Knot, a former president of the Dutch central bank, were the only candidates to emerge after the 5 p.m. deadline, as expected.

Their candidacies are part of a larger game of musical chairs that includes France and Germany, as Europe’s four economic powerhouses negotiate how to secure their seats on the ECB’s executive board.

The ECB is one of the most powerful institutions in Europe, responsible for setting interest rates to keep prices stable at 2% over the medium-term. The six-person executive board oversees the central bank’s day-to-day activities and an army of economists who scrutinize financial markets and the economy at large.

Berlin is determined to hold onto the seat that German economist Isabel Schnabel will vacate on Jan. 3, when she leaves the ECB for a job at the International Monetary Fund. Paris, meanwhile, is targeting the ECB’s chief economist role once the Irish incumbent Philip Lane concludes his eight-year term on May 31.

Eurozone finance ministers will take stock of the ECB shuffling at Monday’s Eurogroup meeting in Brussels. Neither Hernández de Cos nor Knot are scheduled to attend the closed-door meeting. But their national ministers will talk up their respective compatriots.

Diplomats expect EU leaders to engage in horse trading at an informal summit in Dublin at the end of next week. The deadline for candidates to replace Schnabel is on Nov. 27.