New governor of Central Bank of Cyprus appointed

NICOSIA, March 28 (Xinhua) -- A new governor of Central bank of Cyprus (CBC) was appointed on Thursday to replace current CBC chief Chrystalla Georghadji at the end of her five-year term in April, according to an official statement.

The statement said that President Nicos Anastasiades appointed Constantinos Herodotou, an economist and former banker, to lead CBC.

Herodotou has been serving as an executive director and member of the CBC supervisor's board since March 2017, while his previous state job was commissioner for privatization.

The statement said Herodotou joined UBS Investment bank in 2001 in London, and rose to be simultaneously head of two sectors of the bank.

Chrystalla Georghadji became head of the central bank on April 11, 2014, at the height of the financial and banking crisis that hit Cyprus a year before.

She had been strongly criticized for failure to effectively oversee the operations of former Cyprus Cooperative bank, which was finally merged with another bank, and also for failing to take action for the reduction of non-performing loans, totaling 52 percent of the total loan portfolio when she took office.