Meyer to step down from Fed

Lawrence Meyer, a US Federal Reserve Board governor, yesterday said he would resign from the board when his term ends on January 31. His departure will leave a second vacancy on the seven-member Fed board, after the retirement of former governor Edward Kelley last month.

Meyer, 57, has been on the Fed board since June 1996, when he was nominated by President Bill Clinton. He spent much of his tenure as the chairman of the board's supervisory and regulatory affairs committee, and oversaw the implementation of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act - a 1999 law that allowed the formation of financial holding companies like Citigroup.

Meyer also participated in the Basel international capital accord negotiations and led the effort to encourage the development of sophisticated risk management techniques at the United States’ large banking organisations.

“During my term here, we have seen remarkable developments, both in the economy and in the structure of financial markets institutions,” said Meyer in his resignation letter to President George Bush. “These developments have required the Federal Reserve to adapt its monetary and regulatory policies to help our economic system realise its full potential.”

Before becoming a member of the Fed board of governors, Meyer was president of Laurence H Meyer and Associates, a St Louis-based economic consulting firm specialising in macroeconomic forecasting and policy analysis. He was also a professor of economics at Washington University.