Rasminsky, Louis

(b. 1908)

   Governor of the Bank of Canada. A leading Canadian economist and financial expert, Montreal-born Rasminsky served with the League of Nations Secretariat in Geneva from 1930 to 1939. He returned to Ottawa and held important wartime government posts. In 1945, he was chairman of the drafting committee at the Bretton Woods Conference that established the International Monetary Fund (IMF). He represented Canada for many years on the World Bank and the IMF, while serving as a senior official of the Bank of Canada, the central bank of that country. In 1961, he was appointed governor of the Bank, a post he held for twelve years, a period of expansion and at times crisis for the Canadian economy. He came to be regarded as one of the most eminent central bankers in the world, and was particularly effective in dealing with Canada’s financial relations with its powerful American neighbour. Rasminsky was fully identified with the local Jewish community and keenly interested in Israel. He was consulted on the setting up of the Bank of Israel.