The Senado (Chile's Senate) approved the appointment of Macarena Lobos and Juan Esteban Laval as new commissioners of the Comisión para el Mercado Financiero (CMF, Chile's Financial Market Commission) by 31 votes in favor, 11 against and three abstentions. President José Antonio Kast nominated both, and the Senado voted on them jointly.
The CMF is the body that regulates and supervises banks, insurers and the securities market in Chile. According to La Tercera, the appointment required the votes of four-sevenths of sitting senators, that is, 29 of 50 votes. The governing coalition had 26 votes, including those of Demócratas, so it needed outside support.
Lobos and Laval will replace Bernardita Piedrabuena and Augusto Iglesias, whose terms ended two weeks ago. The CMF board is completed by Beltrán de Ramón, Osvaldo Adasme and Catherine Tornel, who chairs it.
Lobos is a lawyer from the Universidad de Chile and holds a doctorate in law from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid. She is an independent close to the Democracia Cristiana (DC, Christian Democrats). In Gabriel Boric's government she served as undersecretary and then minister of the Secretaría General de la Presidencia (Segpres, the ministry that handles the government's legislative agenda). During Michelle Bachelet's second government she held the post of Undersecretary of Finance (Subsecretaría de Hacienda).
Laval was general counsel of the Asociación de Bancos e Instituciones Financieras (Abif, the banking industry association). From 2004 to 2012 he was chief counsel at the Banco Central (Chile's central bank) and, fresh out of law school, worked on the Comisión Rettig (Chile's truth commission). He holds a master's in public policy from Georgetown University in the United States. He is the nephew of former DC senators Andrés and Adolfo Zaldívar.
Before the floor vote, the Senado's comisión de Hacienda (Finance Committee) reviewed whether both met the legal requirement of recognized professional and academic standing in financial matters. Javier Macaya (UDI), Rodolfo Carter (independent-Republicano) and María José Gatica (RN) certified that they did. Socialists Gastón Saavedra and Daniella Cicardini did not give their approval.
According to La Tercera, the Partido Socialista (PS, Socialist Party) objection was political, not technical. Party members complained that candidates close to their views were not considered. They noted that a few weeks ago the Senado already approved another DC-linked nomination: that of Guillermo Larraín to the Consejo Consultivo Previsional (pension advisory council). The PS preferred to renew Piedrabuena, who sought a new term.
On the floor, support came from the right and from center and left senators, including Yasna Provoste, Ximena Órdenes, Pedro Araya and Fidel Espinoza. Voting against were Paulina Vodanovic, Juan Luis Castro, Beatriz Sánchez, Vlado Mirosevic and Diego Ibáñez, among others. Karim Bianchi, Miguel Ángel Calisto and Francisco Huenchumilla abstained.
According to BioBioChile, Ibáñez sharply criticized Laval's appointment. "It is frankly putting the cat in charge of the butcher shop", he said, and alleged a "revolving door" between private and public interests. In his view, the person who until now represented the banks before Congress will go on to sanction his former employer.
With the approval, the CMF board once again has all five members after two weeks with two vacant seats.
