By Paul Vieira
OTTAWA–The chief executive of state-owned Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. is leaving the mortgage insurer to join the International Monetary Fund.
The IMF said Friday that Romy Bowers would become the director of the fund’s risk-management office starting in early January. Bowers was named CEO of CMHC in April 2021, and as of last year the mortgage insurer and state-owned housing agency had total assets of 297 billion Canadian dollars, or the equivalent of US$214.7 billion.
The IMF said Bowers has a “proven track record of developing innovative solutions to complex problems, and deep expertise in financial services risk management.”
Representatives from CMHC were not immediately available for comment.
Bowers joined CMHC in 2015 as the insurer’s chief risk officer. Prior to that, she worked at Canadian lender Bank of Montreal in senior risk-management roles.
Under her watch, CMHC has issued research detailing the housing-supply crunch the Canadian economy faces. CMHC estimates that the country needs an additional 3.5 million units in addition to current building forecasts to return housing affordability to more reasonable levels.
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