José Viñals was appointed to the position of Financial Counsellor and Director of the Monetary and Capital Markets Department of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on 15 April 2009.

Prior to his appointment, Mr. Viñals was Deputy Governor at the Bank of Spain from July 2006.

After joining the Bank of Spain in 1984, he held a number of senior positions and served on a range of advisory and policy committees at the central bank and within the European Union, including as Chairman of the European Central Bank’s International Relations Committee.

A former faculty member in the Economics Department at Stanford University, he holds a master's degree in economics from the London School of Economics and a PhD in economics from Harvard University.

Mr. Viñals has published widely on macroeconomics, monetary policy, and financial issues, and is a research fellow at the Centre for Economic Policy Research.