Exciting First Week For RBA’s New Deputy Governor Bullock

• Published on
• 04 Apr 2022, 04:40 PM

(This Article was first published on Friday, April 1 at 12:16 PM as an email to premium subscribers)

By Sophia Rodrigues

(Sydney, April 1, 2022)—The Reserve Bank of Australia’s new deputy governor Michele Bullock will have an interesting first week in her new position as she attends the monetary policy meeting both as a deputy governor and as the key author of the Financial Stability Review.

Earlier Friday, Australia’s Treasurer Josh Frydenberg announced the appointment of Bullock to the position of RBA’s deputy governor.

Bullock is making history as the first woman to hold the position of Deputy Governor at the RBA. No woman has ever held the position of Governor.

The announcement was largely unsurprising as Bullock was regarded as the preferred internal candidate, given she was the most experienced in an assistant governor role among the four assistant governors.

Bullock’s appointment takes immediate effect which means she will be attending RBA’s monetary policy board meeting on the third day of her job.

Interestingly, Bullock has been at the RBA since 1985 and assistant governor since 2010 but has attended monetary policy meetings on only 11 occasions in her role as assistant governor for financial stability.

The RBA’s next FSR is due on April 8, and by now much of the work for the twice-yearly review would be completed. Bullock would have attended Tuesday’s board meeting in her FSR role. Even if a new assistant governor is announced to replace Bullock’s previous position, she would still be the key person for FSR discussion.

This means apart from attending the meeting as deputy governor, Bullock would have an additional responsibility to lead the discussion on FSR.

An exciting start for the woman making history at the RBA!

--Contact: Sophia@centralbankintel.com