A Chicago economist runs a central bank

Raghu Rajan celebrated his first day on the job running India's central bank. Coverage from Financial Times and Wall Street Journal.

Did he.. Find the coffee machine? Test the sofas in his office? Dust off his desk? Tour the printing press? Or...

Raghuram Rajan unveiled moves to liberalise banking and spread services across the nation of 1.3bn people... 

“There are so many low-hanging fruit in the economy that if we only pluck them we can accelerate growth substantially"...

The measures announced by Mr Rajan...are aimed at freeing India’s banks from the web of state controls that have stifled the sector since independence in 1947. ...

Indian banks will no longer have to receive RBI permission for each branch they want to open, though they will still be obliged to open branches in underserved rural areas in proportion to their expansion in the cities, Mr Rajan said....

He also suggested an easing of “priority sector lending requirements” that oblige banks to lend to farmers and small businesses, and said there was a need to reduce the requirement for banks to invest in government bonds so as to free credit for productive parts of the economy.

To say nothing of the wisdom of  forcing banks to buy shady sovereign debt, which turns sovereign troubles into banking crises, but he can't say that...

...foreign banks would be encouraged to operate in India as wholly owned subsidiaries that would enjoy “near national” treatment on a reciprocal basis.

“The Indian public would benefit from more competition between banks, and banks would benefit from more freedom in decision-making,” he said.

Competition a good thing in the financial sector? Heresy!

Other planned measures included the easing of restrictions on overseas borrowing by banks and on position-taking in financial markets, the introduction of new interest rate futures contracts, and the establishment of new mobile payments systems and “mini-ATMs” run by non-bank financial companies.

Indians who have traditionally turned to gold imports as a hedge against inflation will from the end of November be able to buy government savings certificates linked to a consumer price index, Mr Rajan said.

What will he do on his second day on the job? FT says he "will make his first substantial statement on monetary policy in two weeks." I'm looking forward to it.