The head of the Hungarian Financial Supervisory Authority (HFSA), Istvn Farkas has resigned on 18 June, 2009. The official version is that there was an unsolvable friction between HFSA and the Finance Ministry about HFSA’s organizational management.
Prime Minister Gordon Bajnai has accepted the resignation of Istvn Farkas as of 1 July. Operative management is currently split in two at HFSA between Director General Csaba Varga and two Deputy Director Generals Mihly Erdős and Pter Schiffer.
Financial supervisory rights are exercised by the Supervisory Council, the main decision making body of the HFSA. Its members besides the now resigned Chairman are Gyrgy Lszl Kirly, Gyrgy Lszl Asztalos, Gbor Mikls and Lszl Nray.
HFSA has been in the spotlight of sharp criticism for some months now. In most European countries it is the central bank that presides over commercial banks, but in Hungary banking supervision is (or should be) the responsibility of the HFSA to enforce prudent operation and thwart taking of unnecessary and excessive risks.
L.D.