Mark Carney is a popular figure in the financial world, he is currently Governor of the Bank of England and Chairman of the G20’s Financial Stability Board. Before becoming Governor of the Bank of England he has held a myriad of important positions in both the public and private sectors. Namely, he has remained Governor of the Bank of Canada and has held high positions at Goldman Sachs. Carney is perhaps best known for his role in protecting Canada from the financial crisis of the late 2000s.
Carney was born on March 16, 1965 in a small town in Canada called Fort Smith where his father was a schoolteacher. All his degrees are in economics, he received his bachelors from Harvard then moved to England where he received both MPhil and PhD from University of Oxford. Carney started his career at Goldman Sachs where he worked for 13 years. At the start of his career he was appointed as analyst at the London office, after which he moved to the Tokyo office. He returned to London as Co-Head of Sovereign Risk and Executive Director of Debt Capital Markets with the additional task of advising various European, Middle Eastern and African Heads of State. Carney was later appointed Vice President of Corporate Finance at Goldman Sachs, New York, where he worked on mergers and corporate finance transactions. He then moved to Toronto to manage Goldman Sachs’ investment banking relationships and also served as its Managing Director.
After his banking career Mark Carney joined the Bank of Canada as Deputy Governor in 2003. He spent a year as Deputy Governor before being offered the post of Senior Associate Deputy Minister of Finance. He spent four years in this position before returning to the Bank of Canada when he was offered the Governor’s job. When offered Governorship, Carney was the youngest central bank chief amongst all the G8 and G20 countries. While Governor of the Bank of Canada he made some important decisions that have led to his fame. In 2008, Carney slashed the overnight lending (interest) rate by 0.5% while the European Central Bank increased their lending rate. This led to more confidence in the Canadian economy, higher output and higher employment. Canada was the first country in the G7 to recover after the financial crisis and its GDP and employment rates quickly returned pre-crisis levels. Carney received a lot of acclaim for his leadership and foresight while dealing with the financial crisis in Canada including the title of “Central Bank Governor of the Year 2012” by the editors of Euromoney magazine.
Mark Carney in the only non-Briton to have been nominated as Governor of the Bank of England since its conception. Carney officially succeeded Sir Mervyn King as Governor in July 2013. Since Carney took over as Governor, the Bank of England now has the ability to set bank capital requirements. This means his job at the Bank of England will be more demanding than previous Governors. Carney is well-respected amongst his peers who hold his opinions in high esteem. He is sometimes considered an unorthodox banker and is open to different views. He has risen from humble beginnings far away from the banking world to perhaps the top banking job in the world.