Thanos Catsambas

Dr. Thanos Catsambas is an economist with a 35-year career at the IMF, both as a staff member (1979-2010) and as an Alternate Executive Director at the IMF Executive Board (2012-2015). During his career on the staff, Dr. Catsambas led IMF staff teams that managed economic programs, negotiated terms and conditions with country authorities and monitored compliance and economic performance. He was one of the leaders in developing transition programs for countries of the former Soviet Union to market economies. He was also the architect of a new IMF policy, known as the Safeguards Assessments Policy, which pioneered the IMF’s fiduciary standards for central banks that are now used worldwide to evaluate a central bank’s capacity for financial management and accountability. While on the IMF Executive Board, Dr. Catsambas was intensely involved in the stabilization program for Greece, and, based on his extensive experience with the IMF, on other country and policy issues. Since resigning from the IMF Executive Board in July 2015, Dr. Catsambas has focused on informing public opinion about Greece’s economy and other current issues through presentations, interviews, and articles. Dr. Catsambas publishes regularly on the Greek crisis on his blog and in the form of longer essays, which can be found on his website www.thanoscatsambas.com. His earlier positions include Assistant Professor of Economics at Boston University (1978-79), Advisor to the Governor of the Central Bank of Greece (1985), Economic Counselor and Director of Research of Alpha Bank, Athens, Greece (1989-91) and Senior Economist at the World Bank (1991-1993). Dr. Catsambas is a summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Yale College (1971). He also holds M.A. (1973), M.Phil. (1975) and Ph.D. (1977) degrees in economics from Yale University. Website: www.thanoscatsambas.com