FDIC announces its director of insurance will leave agency after May

The top insurance executive for the federal fund that insures bank deposits is retiring, effective at the end of May, after a 34-year career, the agency announced Wednesday.

Diane Ellis, director of the division of insurance and research for the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC), will leave the agency on May 31, the agency said. She has served as director since 2013, when she was appointed to oversee the economic, banking, and policy research program and management of the agency’s Deposit Insurance Fund (DIF), the FDIC said.

Before that, she served as deputy director for financial risk management and research (from 2008 to 2012). The agency, in a release, said “she played a significant role in the FDIC’s response to the 2008 financial crisis by leading the development of the Temporary Liquidity Guarantee Program, which guaranteed more than $618 billion in bank debt and more than $800 billion in deposits.”

She joined the agency in 1988 as a financial institutions examiner in the FDIC Division of Risk Management and Supervision during the savings-and-loan crisis, the FDIC said.

The timing of her retirement means Ellis’ replacement will be appointed by the next chairman of the FDIC Board, since Chairman Jelena McWilliams has said she is leaving the board next week (Feb. 4).

FDIC Announces Retirement of Diane Ellis, Director of the Division of Insurance and Research