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Bank of England appoints Huw Pill new chief economist to replace Andy Haldane

Huw Pill, the incoming chief economist at the Bank of England. Photo: Bank of England
Huw Pill, the incoming chief economist at the Bank of England. Photo: Bank of England

Huw Pill has been appointed the Bank of England's (BoE) new chief economist, and will step into the shoes of outgoing Andy Haldane.

Pill will also become a member of the nine-person Monetary Policy Committee (MPC), which sets interest rates and has been a crucial force in steering the financial policy in the time of COVID.

The appointment ends a protracted search for a successor to Haldane, who was known as one of the more bullish members of the MPC.

He joins from Harvard Business School where he has been a senior lecturer since 2018. Before Harvard, he worked for Goldman Sachs as their chief European economist. He has a central bank pedigree having held several other senior posts at the European Central Bank (ECB). Pill last worked at the BoE in the 1990s when he was contemporaries of Haldane and Spencer Dale, another previous chief economist.

Pill will report to the deputy governor for Monetary Policy, Ben Broadbent.

“I am delighted about the appointment of Huw Pill as the Bank’s new Chief Economist," said Broadbent. "His breadth of experience across monetary policy, economic research and financial markets will be invaluable to the Bank and the MPC.”

“Huw will make a major contribution to monetary policy – and to the broader work of the Bank. I greatly look forward to working with him," said BoE governor Andrew Bailey.

In April it was announced that veteran Andy Haldane would leave the bank after a 30-year tenure.

Haldane left the bank to become chief executive of the Royal Society for Arts (RSA), one of the UK's most historic intellectual institutions.

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Haldane became chief economist at the Bank of England in 2014, the same year Time magazine named Haldane among the 100 most influential people in the world.

“It is a great privilege to rejoin the Bank and have the opportunity to contribute to the work of the MPC and the Bank more broadly at what remains a challenging time for monetary policy and central banking,” said Pill.

Watch: Huw Pill speaks on Italian elections in 2019