Bush Chooses Two Financial Execs for Fed Board
The White House said on Tuesday that President Bush plans to nominate two financial service company executives, Larry Klane and Elizabeth Duke, to fill vacancies on the Federal Reserve Board.
In a statement, the White House also said Bush would tap current Fed Governor Randall Kroszner to serve a full 14-year term on the Washington, D.C.-based board once the partial term he is serving expires on Jan. 31, 2008.
Klane is president for global financial services at Capital One Financial and Duke is chief operating officer of TowneBank in Portsmouth, Virginia.
The positions require Senate confirmation. If approved, Klane and Duke will fill Fed seats left open by the departures of Susan Bies and Mark Olson.
Olson stepped down from the Fed board last June, while Bies resigned at the end of March, leaving two open seats on the normally seven-strong board -- the nucleus of U.S. monetary policy-making.
Both of those former Fed governors had banking backgrounds. In moving to nominate Klane and Duke, the White House is seeking to replace some of their hands-on expertise.
Kroszner, who took office on March 1, 2006, was previously a professor at the University of Chicago who had served on Bush's Council of Economic Advisers from 2001 to 2003.
