Debt bomb and shadow banking: What China's new central bank governor faces

A distressed financial system could trigger a systemic economic collapse in China

The Chinese government has appointed a new head of its central bank. Yi Gang, currently the deputy governor of the People’s Bank of China, will take over the leadership from Zhou Xiaochuan, who had been in the position since 2002.

As China’s central bank oversees the stability of the world’s second-largest economy and the world’s largest pile of foreign reserves, this is a change the global economy is watching closely.

A US-trained economist, Yi received his doctorate in economics from the University of Illinois in 1986. He was a professor at Peking University