Geoffrey Okamoto, a senior US Treasury department official and former congressional staffer, has emerged as a possible replacement for David Lipton as the second-highest ranking official at the IMF, according to people familiar with the matter.
Mr Okamoto, 35, has been heavily involved in managing the Trump administration’s relations with international economic institutions in recent years as acting assistant secretary for international finance and development at the Treasury department.
But Mr Okamoto would lack the breadth of economic experience that Mr Lipton or John Lipsky, his predecessor, brought to the position, which has a critical role in directing the fund from a policy point of view, and could raise eyebrows within the IMF and finance ministries around the world.
Mr Okamoto’s selection for the position is far from guaranteed, as other candidates might still surface. Kristalina Georgieva, the IMF chief, last week announced Mr Lipton would be stepping down from the job at the end of February.
This follows a nine-year tenure during which he played a pivotal role in managing multibillion-dollar rescue packages for countries ranging from Argentina to Ukraine to Pakistan and eurozone countries.
The second-highest ranking official at the IMF has traditionally been an American, so the appointment will have to be agreed between Ms Georgieva and Steven Mnuchin, the US Treasury secretary, and approved by the IMF executive board, which represents its member states.
Mr Okamoto’s possible move to the IMF was first reported by Bloomberg News. The US Treasury department and IMF declined to comment.
A California native, Mr Okamoto earned his bachelors degree at California State Polytechnic University and a masters degree at Georgetown University. After a stint as a consultant at KPMG, Mr Okamoto moved to Capitol Hill, where he worked for Republican lawmakers in both the House of Representatives and Senate as an adviser on financial services policy, including at an international level, before joining Donald Trump’s transition team in the aftermath of the 2016 election.
At Treasury, Mr Okamoto also played a role in trade negotiations with China, which were led by Mr Mnuchin, along with Robert Lighthizer, the US trade representative, on the American side.
