Debt bomb and shadow banking: What China's new central bank governor faces

The Chinese government has appointed a new head of its central bank. Yi Gang, currently the deputy governor of the People’s Bank of China, will take over the leadership from Zhou Xiaochuan, who had been in the position since 2002.

As China’s central bank oversees the stability of the world’s second-largest economy and the world’s largest pile of foreign reserves, this is a change the global economy is watching closely.

A US-trained economist, Yi received his doctorate in economics from the University of Illinois in 1986. He was a professor at Peking University in China following various academic positions in the US, before joining China’s central bank in 1997. Yi is known in academia for his expertise on inflation and price instability.

Yi developed his technocratic career exclusively within the headquarters of the central bank, taking up various leading positions in areas of monetary policy, exchange rate policy, and foreign reserve management. He then became the right-hand man of Zhou, who dominated Beijing’s economic policy-making for a record 15 years.