EU governments seek name for IMF head among four, with no UK candidate

European Union finance ministers are set on Friday to choose the bloc's candidate to lead the International Monetary Fund from a list of four names, a spokeswoman for the French government said. The list includes Jeroen Dijsselbloem, the Dutch former head of eurozone finance ministers; Nadia Calvino, the Spanish economy minister; Olli Rehn, the Finnish central bank governor; and Bulgaria's World Bank chief executive Kristalina Georgieva.

Mario Centeno, the Portuguese chairman of eurozone finance ministers, said on Thursday he was pulling out of the race "in this stage of the process", adding that he would be available if needed for a compromise solution. Britain did not field a candidate because it could not come up with a name on time, a European official said. It had been expected to name a candidate and the deadline was extended by a few hours on Thursday to allow it to do so.

France is leading the process to select a European candidate. The top job at the Washington-based global lender has historically been filled by a European. Outgoing IMF head Christine Lagarde is taking over from Mario Draghi as European Central Bank president.