IMF Board to See Georgieva and Law Firm in Rare Sunday Meetings

(Bloomberg) -- The International Monetary Fund’s executive board plans to speak with law firm WilmerHale and then fund chief Kristalina Georgieva in rare Sunday meetings as it pushes to finish an ethics review that has become a central topic at the lender, according to people familiar with the plan.

The meetings are planned for Sunday afternoon, according to two people with knowledge of the plans, who asked not to be identified because the meetings will take place in private. The IMF press office declined to comment.

On Friday spokesman Gerry Rice said that the board met that day and agreed to “request more clarifying details with a view to very soon concluding” consideration of the matter.

The board met with WilmerHale and Georgieva last week as well. The members are discussing an audit that the law firm did for the World Bank, based on a review of 80,000 documents and more than 30 interviews. It accuses Georgieva of pressuring staff to manipulate data for the annual “Doing Business” report to benefit China when she was a top official at the development lender. Georgieva, who joined the IMF in 2019, has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing. 

Treasury Department officials last week were debating whether the U.S., the IMF’s largest shareholder, should ask Georgieva to resign, Bloomberg News reported on Wednesday, citing people familiar with the situation. Georgieva’s future has become an issue ahead of IMF and World Bank annual meetings where finance ministers and central bankers from across the world will gather in Washington starting on Monday.

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