Hesse nominates Fritzi Köhler-Geib to join Bundesbank Board

The Hessian state government has finally made a decision after a long search. Fritzi Köhler-Geib is set to take over the vacant position on the board of the Bundesbank, according to information from the Tagesspiegel. Köhler-Geib currently serves as the chief economist at the Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW) in Frankfurt am Main. It was important to Prime Minister Boris Rhein (CDU) to nominate a politically independent woman for the role.

The Federal Council has the formal right to propose the position for the board member that Köhler-Geib is to assume, but approval from the states in the upcoming meeting is considered certain. The delay in making this decision by Hesse was attributed to a change in government from black-green to black-red in January of this year.

Köhler-Geib, who is 46 years old, has been the chief economist at the state-owned development bank KfW since 2019. Her previous experience includes working for the World Bank. As chief economist, she is responsible for research and analysis services at KfW, with a focus on analyzing economic developments and growth trends in Germany.

The Bundesbank’s Executive Board is almost fully staffed again after a long period of vacancies. Most recently, the black-green state government in North Rhine-Westphalia nominated Lutz Lienenkämper from the CDU. Köhler-Geib will replace the board members who left last year. The federal government still needs to decide on Claudia Buch’s successor, who stepped down in March to become the head of banking supervision at the European Central Bank (ECB).