IT’S been a while since I attended the annual reception for the banking community (a.k.a. Bankers’ Night), hosted by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) led by its governor, Amando “Say” M. Tetangco Jr.
It is traditionally held every January, at the beginning of each year, in recognition of the anniversary of central banking in the Philippines. As Tetangco himself informed us young people (ahem!) among his guests on January 10, “the central bank of the Philippines opened for business for the first time on January 3, 1949—that’s 68 years ago.”
But this Bankers’ Night being Tetangco’s last to host, I just had to be there, like many others, to celebrate his strong stewardship of the economy for the past 12 years, even amid the external global shocks and the current challenges in the country.
Tetangco has been a career central banker for over 42 years, having started as a statistician in 1974. He once told me that he never thought he would become head of the BSP, even when he had already been deputy governor for six years under his predecessors, the late Gabriel C. Singson and the late Rafael B. Buenaventura. “It just never happened before, I mean, that a career central banker became BSP governor.” (See, “Tetangco Right On Target” https://bit.ly/2jgEuq4)
With him at the BSP’s helm, inflation rate fell to less than 3 percent in 2016 alone, enabling the BSP to cut its key interest rates to record lows, and fueling economic expansion by 7 percent in the last three quarters of 2016.
Last September New York’s Global Finance magazine accorded Tetangco his eighth successive grade “A” in its annual Central Banker Report Cards, for his expertise in controlling inflation, achieving economic-growth goals, stabilizing the currency, and managing interest rates. He’s one in only eight central bankers who received that grade last year.
So, as we all hobnobbed among the bankers and financial executives, like Philippine Stock Exchange President Hans M. Sicat, lawmakers, such as Senate President Koko L. Pimentel, and other government executives, like Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Ernesto M. Pernia, there was a wild guessing game who could potentially take on the tough job of chief central banker for the country. (His tenure officially ends on July 2. According to a Bloomberg report on Wednesday quoting Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III, extending Tetangcos’ term was just “not in the stars.”)
At one point during the event held at the Metropolitan Museum of Manila, some naughty journalists, who I shall not name, gathered Tetangco and some of those rumored to be candidates for his post for a photo opportunity. Tetangco and these men-in-waiting—BSP Deputy Governor Nesting A. Espenilla Jr., BSP Deputy Gov. Diwa C. Guinigundo, former PNB/Allied Bank President and Monetary Board member Peter B. Favila, and East-West Bank President Tony C. Moncupa Jr.—gamely posed, a few bashfully grinning like boys caught playing hooky from school, much to the delight of those present.
During his speech before his guests, with Phyllis Zaballero’s celebratory A Woman’s Life in Six Acts as backdrop, Tetangco expressed gratitude to his partners in the banking community for helping him manage the economy well. “The Philippine economy has recorded 71 quarters of uninterrupted growth. Our banks helped nurture this virtuous cycle for our economy.” He also thanked his fellow Monetary Board members—Alfredo C. Antonio, Felipe M. Medalla, Armando L. Suratos, Juan De Zuñiga Jr. and Val Araneta—“whose collective wisdom enables us to craft policies that have secured for us the stability of the past and the present, and the promise of an exceptional future.”
For someone who never dreamed he would become BSP governor, Tetangco has certainly acquitted himself admirably. And whoever is chosen to take over his post will certainly have very big shoes to fill.
Cheers, Gov. Say! Take a bow, for a job well done.
Image credits: Stella Arnaldo, BSP
1 comment
One of the BSP Deputy Gov.’s should be appointed, just like Gov. Tetangco, a career central banker, who does not owe former private employers a favor.