EIOPA’s board of supervisors this week decided on a shortlist of three candidates for the position of chairperson, the Frankfurt-based occupational pensions authority announced yesterday.

It indicated the shortlist “ensur[ed] gender representation”.

In alphabetical order, the short-listed candidates are:

  • Paolo Cadoni, head of division, prudential policy directorate at the Prudential Regulation Authority, Bank of England;
  • Petra Hielkema, director for insurance supervision at De Nederlandsche Bank; and
  • Christian Thimann, CEO of Athora Germany, a life insurer.

The decision of a shortlist comes after the board of supervisors last year relaunched the procedure for finding a successor to Gabriel Bernardino.

Bernardino, who has been chair of EIOPA since its founding in 2011, stepped down this month after having served for the maximum of two five-year terms.

The shortlist for a new EIOPA chair has now been submitted to the European Parliament’s committee on economic and monetary affairs and the European Council. MEPs interview the candidates in hearings before making a decision about their preferred candidate, with the Council making the final decision.

On the occassion of EIOPA’s 10th anniversary conference last month EIOPA said that Peter Braumüller, managing director of insurance and pension supervision at the Austrian financial market regulator FMA and vice chair of EIOPA, would take on the role of interim chair until a successor to Bernardino is appointed.

In his farewell speech Bernardino pointed to the upcoming reivew of the IORP II Directive as ”a great opportunity to implement a fresh and more ambitious agenda” in occupational pensions.

In an exit interview with IPE, he said “sometimes I felt that the pension industry was too conservative and sometimes mostly defensive – not so much able to see the possibilities that change could bring”.

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