By Jared Malsin and Chelsey Dulaney

ISTANBUL--Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan appointed a former First Republic Bank executive to lead the central bank, a likely shift away from the unorthodox economic policies that have sown economic instability and driven away foreign investors.

The new central bank governor is Hafize Gaye Erkan, who until late 2021 was the co-chief executive officer of First Republic Bank, which collapsed and was sold to JPMorgan Chase last month. She previously worked for Goldman Sachs and served on the board of Tiffany & Co.

Erkan is Turkey's first woman central bank governor and replaces Sahap Kavcioglu, an Erdogan loyalist who was installed in March 2021 as the Turkish president took greater command over the economy. Erdogan pressured the bank into a series of interest-rate cuts that year that plunged Turkey into a currency crisis and stoked punishing inflation.

Write to Jared Malsin at jared.malsin@wsj.com and Chelsey Dulaney at chelsey.dulaney@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

June 09, 2023 03:52 ET (07:52 GMT)